EgyptAdbydos: I actually dream about this so please enjoy and R &R.

Summary - Something happens that makes Bruce angry. So angry that he doesn't hulk out, but stays calm and proceeds to do something incredibly intelligent, precise, and shit-your-pants-scary.

See, the real person to be afraid of isn't the rampaging Hulk but the super-genius who knows how to control gamma radiation and has learned exactly where the most vulnerable parts in the body are and how long someone can stay alive under intense pain. He knows how to break a person mentally, how to prey upon people's fears and out-psyche them. He also knows that there is no stopping himself once someone close to him has been hurt.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter two

The grainy image flickered, mocking them in their helplessness. Tony cursed and swore as he wiggled in his bonds, ignoring the hand fisted in his hair, forcing him to look at the video feed, linked to an open area.

Beside him he could hear Clint swearing in an impressive amount of languages, Natasha echoing his sentiments. Steve was quiet, but noble, and Thor so drugged he could barely lift a finger.

It was, in fact, a little scarily reminiscent of the last time they had been captured, where the only member of the team missing was Bruce. Because he was missing now. Again. He was always missing. Yeah, he was missing because he was always off in India, and Brazil, and China helping out the people who couldn't help themselves, but still.

Hulk would really be appreciated about now.

"Once we have the Hulk in our hands, kill the rest. We don't need them."

Or maybe not.

Tony ground his teeth together, tensing and getting ready for what would happen next. For any sign of weakness that would allow him to escape and just warn Bruce-

The camera flickered, and a voice spoke through the loudspeaker, "Ah, Doctor Banner. I'm so pleased that you decided to join us. Please, come closer."

Tony's breath froze as Bruce stepped into view on the screen.

He had him. He had the Hulk within grabbing distance. The quiet, ruffled looking scientist was standing in his room, hands in his pockets, dark eyes watching him. The man smiled, wanting to proclaim his victory to the world.

He, Glen Talbot, had done what Ross couldn't. He had managed to successfully convince Bruce Banner, otherwise known as the Hulk into peacefully giving himself up. Of course, while it might be in exchange for his teammates, he had not intention of letting the Avengers go.

Loose cannons, all of them, uncontrollable and would one day lead to the ruin of America. Thereby, he was eliminating two threats at once.

"Where are they? Where are my teammates? Where's Tony?"

He smiled, coldly, confident that the doctor wouldn't dare cross him. The doctor, appropriately, took a step back, hands still in pockets. "You will see them Banner, when I say so, and not before."

Dark eyes flashed, and a hand in a pocket curled. "Now then Doctor Banner, shall we discuss the terms?"

He had to stall for time, let his men get into position, readying the guns from above-

THUD!

The sound of a body hitting the floor made him whirl. His bodyguard, lurking out of sight, crumbled to the ground. "What-"

There were more thuds, of people falling, and he felt the first creeps of terror fall on him. Then, a low, amused voice spoke at his shoulder, "Is something wrong Talbot?"

He couldn't help that terrified screech of surprise as he jumped and turned, Banner standing right behind him. Talbot took a deep breath, staring at the scientist with wide eyes. Bruce smiled back, a calm, gentle smile like one would have with a child.

"Really Talbot, you should calm down. There's no need to be all surprised. Now, I believe we were talking about conditions?" Bruce's smile didn't twitch from it's calm position.

Tony leaned forward, squinting at the screen, "What is he doing?"

"I don't know, but he needs to keep it up!" Clint snarled from behind him, shifting against his bonds, as the unconscious men lay behind them.

"Natasha, Clint, do you know anything in Shield that could do this?" Steve questioned, almost uneasily, and Tony glared out of the corner of his eye, because was Steve seriously suggesting what Tony thought he was?

"No." He twisted to look at Natasha's pale face. "I've never heard of anything that could do something like this."

"What did you do Banner?!" His voice embarrassingly, rose an octave, as he took a step back.

Bruce shook his head. "Don't wander too far now Talbot~" How did he know his name? He didn't give out his name. How? "We wouldn't want you to become like your men, now would we? We still have conditions to discuss."

He froze, back going stiff. "What. Did. You. Do."

Maybe, just maybe, one of his men was still awake enough or missed whatever poison Banner had dumped into their food supply somehow. If they knew how to counteract it- "Gamma pulses."

He collapsed to his knees. Gamma? Gamma radiation? Was he going to turn into a monster like Banner was? No, no, no he couldn't- didn't-

Then dark brown eyes were near his, mere inches away. "Get up Talbot. You're not allowed to die until I know that what's mine is safe." There was a long moment of silence as Talbot stared at him. "Now, I know what you want to do with me. You want to dissect me."

Banner pulled himself to his full height, somehow looking unthreatening in a terrifying way that sent a shiver down his spine, because Banner was still smiling. "You want to dissect me. Hardly an original thought. Three groups have tried dissecting me already."

"Really? Three? Hey, super-assassins, what do you-"

"We know nothing Tony." Natasha said flatly, "This is the first time I've heard it as well."

"Guys, quiet down, I can't hear." Steve snapped, leaning in closer, as Tony glowered- Why was everyone being so blind to Bruce's pain-

Then he heard it, Banner's voice, "According to my own research, a human can only last a full out dissection for maybe two, three hours. Four, if you're careful. But the human body can only take so much, especially when being full dissected. Surgery is different. Surgery is just going in to a specific place, but dissection? Messy, messy business."

And Tony's stomach dropped right out of his body, because he knew that voice, Bruce and him talked in those voices all the time when considering a problem- Professional detachment.

Talbot swallowed hard, gathering what little courage he had left into his legs, forcing himself to get up, stand up. "We weren't planning on-"

"Don't you dare try to lie to me Talbot." Banner's voice had abruptly gone soft, deadly, threatening, but Talbot couldn't understand it, there wasn't even a hint of green in those deadly brown eyes. Hulk... Hulk was the scarier of the two, wasn't he?

"You took what's mine and you expect to walk away from it? You expect anyone in this entire base to walk away from it?"

Talbot felt the growing of icy-cold dread in his stomach. This base had women and little children on it. Those kids. "Banner, there's kids here, you can't honestly-"

"They're dead already." Bruce's voice was completely congenial, as if he were talking about the weather. "They would've died first."

"Your team, they can't possibly-"

"No, no. I take care of what's mine you know? Whenever I turn into the Hulk, I release Gamma radiation. There's no point in being with them if I'll just kill them, right? So I've inoculated them against gamma radiation. It's very easy to slip into their food you know." Banner smiled oh so gently, "It isn't something Jarvis can even register. Very handy."

"Please tell me that Banner has not been poisoning our food."

"I- That's- But Jarvis is calibrated to recognize-"

"But is he calibrated to the specific inoculation? Because I don't know much about medicine, but… it sounds like there's all sorts of cures that have nothing to do with the disease specifically."

"Yeah, but… I didn't think anyone had created any, otherwise Bruce would've gotten rid of the Hulk."

"It doesn't have to work on him, just on us." Clint pointed out dryly, even as there was the sound of a rope finally snapping, "But I guess I could see why he'd do that if he keeps emitting gamma rays whenever he changes."

"Clint, but he's only been doing it to us. Not to all of the other Shield Agents who are around at the same time." Natasha pointed out softly.

Talbot forced himself to his feet, eyes flickering around the room. "So then, if it's gamma, this room must have been reinforced." That meant that his attack team could still be waiting.

The smile didn't change, or so much as flicker. "No. It's not. What you're looking at is a tiny pocket. I set up two emitters, that, in this room, in a twenty foot diameter meld together to cancel each other out. But~ you take one step outside of that parameter, and your skin will begin to peel off in boils, your bowels will go completely slack, and you will die screaming in horrible pain due to the amplification of the waves on the edge."

He stared numbly- he didn't doubt him. He didn't doubt Bruce, not for one second. Which is why he stood stiff and frozen as Bruce stalked around him, practically purring, every inch the monster that they thought Hulk was. "Now then, I wonder what I should do. You took what's mine. I don't appreciate that. Not at all."

Bruce paused, mere inches away from him. "You have a wife, don't you. And three kids? What were their names, oh yes, Mary, Joseph, James, and Benjamin. There's four. That will compensate for one of my teammates. So who next?"

Bruce circled around him, "I don't think you could survive a dissection for thirty minutes, but there are other ways- You're such a good Christian man, aren't you? Always using your hands to help. A good fourth of your bones are in your hands you know. Maybe I should take them."

Bruce picked up his hand, and he stood, rooted to the spot, unable to even pull together enough feeling to be terrified of the way a thumb brushed against the back of his hand. "I wonder how well that would go, you having no bones in your hands. There's instruments for that."

Eyes flickered up. "Oh, I know. You have the exact color that I've always wanted."

"Wanted?"

"Have you ever been skinned alive Talbot? It's a painful process, I know, but you'll at least live. For now of course."

Banner slipped around him, eyeing him like he was already a dead body on the slab, ready to be used. And he was. He knew he was dead, just still breathing, and he wanted to get away-

"Now, now, we can't have you running, now can we?"

There was a quick swipe and then there was painpainpainpainpain. "That was your hamstring. You won't be able to walk more then a mile for the rest of your life. Not that you're going to survive that much longer." Bruce held up slightly bloody dagger. "Even if you escape me, this blade was smeared with poison. Unless I administer the antidote within ten hours, you will die by dehydration. Dying by throwing up is such a painful, pitiful, slow agonizing death. It might compensate for a pinky finger. So I suppose I'll have to work fast then, to extract my compensation."

"Sh-Shield-"

"Oh, you honestly think a pathetic organization like Shield is going to save you? Despite Fury's confidence, it's easy to take down that organization- The invisible helicarrier is so delicate after all, just one cut wire, and it's useless."

Talbot bowed his head, and began to shiver, completely and utterly terrified for his life.

Clint broke the bonds with a triumphant yell- Natasha was right behind him, and the two spies quickly spread out to the room, freeing the other Avengers. On screen, and through the mic that had been originally supposed to torment them, Bruce Banner laughed quietly and happily, like he would when he and Tony stumbled out of the lab, after a full day of SCIENCE.

Tony knew that laugh, he'd heard it in the lab, in bed, around the tower- it had used to be comforting. But now… It was still comforting in a vaguely creepy way.

Bruce loved him enough to kill. Bruce loved him enough to set up a gamma emitter that was killing every single last person in the entire building, and he was insane but he still wanted nothing more then to wrap around Bruce, and cuddle him late into the night.

"Now, the question is, what're we going to do about Bruce? We can't-"

"He isn't going against us guys." Tony interrupted harshly, defensively, because Bruce was his "You heard him, he considers the team to be important."

Steve looked at him helplessly, "For now- But then what? What happens after Tony?"

"He won't hurt us." Tony insisted stubbornly, "He doesn't do that."

Clint pointed mutely at the screen, where Talbot had broken down into whimpering cries and sobs for mercy. The man was never going to recover from that. Never.

Bruce laughed, full of dark delight. "That's what you get for harming me and mine. I'm going to take it back, and my scales are far heavier then yours. I hope you enjoy being alone Talbot, because every last family member, all the way down to your second cousin Theresa that you kissed five summers ago is disappearing."

Tony Stark stared at it, stared at the inexorable conclusion that stared him in the face, no matter how hard he raged against it- and sighed. "But I- I love him."

Steve reached out cautiously to clasp him on the shoulder, eyes dark, but understanding.

Natasha pointed out quietly, "There's nothing we can do. There's no poison strong enough to kill him, no drug powerful enough to keep him down for more then a few hours. All we can do is hope."

Hope that Bruce never, ever turned against them.

"I can do that." Tony agreed, grasping at the straws offered. "C'mon, let's go retrieve Banner. And not a word of this to him."

Clint grinned through gritted teeth. "I prefer Hulk. Can we just permanently Hulk him out? Hulk isn't scary. He's a big kid. I like Hulk and he likes me."

"So does Bruce." Tony snapped back, and began rewiring the speaker. "Bruce likes us. If he didn't…"

Then they would all be dead in their beds by an untraceable poison.

But still- Tony rewired, they pulled off a little magic, and soon Bruce wrapped both arms around him, and Tony sighed as he leaned into those arms, as Bruce hummed in delight. It was like Talbot had never happened, like the gamma emitters didn't exist, and he was home.

It was a terrifying home, but it was Bruce.

They were both wrapped up in each other enough not to notice Natasha keep one hand on her gun, or how Clint fingered tranquilizing arrow, or Steve tense every time Bruce shifted.

Bruce would. Eventually.

Just not now.