"On the brink of the dark he stood, with only the dream of the cities, the million books, the spectral images of the people he had loved, who had loved him, whom he had known and lost. They will not come again. They never will come back again."

Look Homeward, Angel

x x x

Jack stopped staring out his office window and instead began turning the business card Molly had given him last spring over and over, thinking about giving the doctor a try.

All of his other leads on the Hulk had dried up months ago. Maybe it would be worth it to see the doc if somewhere in his head he was hiding John Doe's real name.

God knows his editor would applaud Jack starting therapy. Mark often told him that his Hulk obsession had gotten out of hand. "Jack, you don't have a life anymore, your John Doe has stolen it."

Mark had said lunch was on him today. Mark was a bit of a mother hen. Instead of foisting chicken soup on friends he was concerned about, though, he bought them lunch. Well, he would as soon as Jack finished this ridiculous assignment on whether Farrah Fawcett had become deranged due to her divorce from Lee Majors and shaved her head. She hadn't. He was so sick of tabloid writing. Maybe Mark would give him a real assignment. Another serial killer, maybe. Just, please God, no astrologists predicting the end of the world, or alien babies born to unsuspecting mothers.

Sighing, he laid the card with Dr. Cooper's contact information down and returned to his story. It was pap, but he would make sure it was at least readable.

x x x

At the switchboard, Judy waved a piece of paper at him when he returned from lunch. Mark had sprung for deep dish pizza at that little place that Joe Arnold had unjustly targeted for breaking multiple health food regulations. The prick had set Jill and Karen up, but the two owners had proved that Joe and his muscle guy had brought in cockroaches and dirtied the place up just to do a story. Jack had done the expose, but it hadn't brought him any satisfaction, knowing it was a fellow employee who'd tried to ruin Jill's and Karen's restaurant.

Mark felt a little bad that it had been a National Register reporter behind the malicious attack on Bruno's, and he liked to throw them business to make up for it. Jack had first stopped by because the Hulk had wrecked the kitchen. The girls wouldn't talk about him but he knew that John had worked there, years ago now. Jack knew the girls kept John's picture on the wall, along with other photographs of customer's birthday parties and couples celebrating anniversaries. He'd looked at it again this afternoon while Mark paid the bill. John had been photographed walking away from the camera and only the back of his head and body was visible. It was a perfect portrait of his John Doe, with his thin frame and wavy dark brown hair and no way to identify his face.

He didn't recognize the name and number Judy had handed him. After he'd hung his jacket up in his office, he settled himself in his chair, and called the man.

After talking with Peter Carlson, he got his Hulk file out of his desk drawer and grabbed his jacket. If Mark refused to let him go to Dr. Helen Banner-Carlson's and her father's funerals, then he'd take vacation time instead. One way or another, he was going to be there. John Doe had come to that small Colorado town and the only reason that he had ever found for John to do that was David Banner's sister and father lived nearby on a family farm. He'd come once, for what ever reason, and Jack would gamble that he would come for the funerals, if he heard about them.

x x x

Jack threaded his way through the crowd of people at the funeral home in Treverton, Colorado, keeping a wary eye out for John. He didn't think he'd come by when there were so many other people here, but just in case, he was ready. He patted the tranquilizer gun hidden under his long jacket.

God, what a hard time this family had endured: The mother dead when David and Helen were children, David dying in the lab fire, and now Helen's death in an automobile accident, the shock of her death bringing on a heart attack for her father. She had married two years ago, and was survived by her husband, Peter, and her seven month old baby.

He waited his turn to pay his respects to the man who had called him, after finding his number in Mr. Banner's address book. Peter Carlson was a tall muscular blond man in his late thirties, and he held his sleeping son with one hand, the baby's dark head nestled into his father's neck.

"Hello, I'm Jack McGee. I'm so very sorry for your loss. Helen was a brilliant woman, and she and Mr. Banner made me welcome when I met them a few Thanksgivings ago."

"Mr. McGee, thank you for coming, and all the way from Chicago. Helen never mentioned you, I don't think. Did you grow up here in Treverton, too?"

"No, I'm originally from St. Louis."

"How did you know the family?" asked Peter, and patted his son's back when the baby made a snuffly sound.

"I knew David Banner." He was stretching the truth on that last part. It was a lot more accurate to say that he'd met Helen's brother. But he'd watched the man sacrifice himself to try to save his childhood friend and colleague, and he'd made a promise that his killer would be brought to justice. He might not have known Dr. David Banner, but he was bound to him, all the same.

"I never met her brother, he died a couple of years before I met Helen." Peter's eyes grew shiny and he blinked hard.

"He was well liked, and a very, very smart man." Jack said.

"Helen had a hard time talking about him, about his death, but she told me a lot of stories about the two of them growing up. He was a little scientist doctor type even when he was a kid. She used to pretend to still be annoyed with him for dissecting her doll when she was five and he was seven. She told me that whenever she wanted him to do a favor for her, she'd bring up the doll story. I think she had her big brother wrapped around her little finger."

Jack smiled, charmed by the story.

Peter said, "The woman who died with him, she was a friend of Helen's and David's, too. Her family moved away from here when she was in college, I was told." The baby stirred and arched his back, his father's big hand keeping him from falling. Peter turned him around and held him in the crook of his arm, one finger tracing the soft baby features. "This is Peter David Carlson. We, we call him Davy."

Jack wasn't much for babies. They were kind of incomprehensible to him, but he held out a finger and Davy grabbed it and tugged it into his mouth. Jack felt a sharp little tooth as the baby used his finger as a teething ring.

Jack looked up into Peter's eyes, wondering how the guy felt about Jack's finger being in his son's mouth, and saw that a few tears had slipped down his face. Jack said awkwardly, "Is there anything I can do for you?" He was so bad at things like this. He remembered his parent's funerals and how he felt so exposed and numb at the same time.

"Ah, would you hold him for a moment? I'd like to head to the john, and..." Peter swiped his cheeks with his free hand and Jack took Davy from him, holding him the way his father had been doing.

Peter bent and kissed the top of his son's head and nodded to Jack. "Thanks. I'll be right back. If he starts to cry, jiggle him and walk around."

Jack remembered that David Banner's father and sister had been proud that there had been family working their farm since the Civil War. He wondered if little Davy here would grow up farming the family place like his grandfather and mother or if he'd leave his home town, like the uncle he was named for had done. He felt the baby start to stiffen, so he walked around the room to distract the little ankle biter.

And in case John Doe made an appearance after all, he made notes of places in the renovated mansion where he could sit or stand unobtrusively.

x x x

John didn't come that afternoon or evening, Jack was sure of it. Maybe John hadn't heard about the deaths after all. But if he had, and if there were people here that could identify him, know him for someone who'd escaped from prison or who was wanted by the police, or was faking his death, then he might come to grieve by the graves privately. The more Jack thought about it, the more it made sense to him that John must have known David Banner. John came to him and Doctor Marks for help, but it was David's family he came to see, that Thanksgiving almost three years ago. Maybe he thought Doctor Banner had notes here or had confided in his sister, who'd been a scientist as well. Or maybe he knew David's family and had come to visit.

Jack had eaten Thanksgiving dinner with the Banner family, because a missing relative was unable to come at the last minute. Jack remembered telling Helen and Mr. Banner that it had been awhile since he'd had a home cooked meal. The TV dinners he heated up for himself in his little apartment were about as inventive as he ever got in the kitchen.

He had a strong suspicion that the missing relative had been his John Doe.

x x x

Jack had stayed at the funeral home, meeting more relatives and friends of the deceased. He lurked in quiet corners where he was able to watch the people coming and going, until it closed. He didn't plan to attend the funeral the next morning, but he would be on stakeout duty. The service was in a small church in town, but the graveyard was on the family farm. He'd been told it was a small plot where Banners had been buried for many generations.

The next morning he sat in his car outside the church and watched the people in their somber clothing entering; he left once and checked to see if John had slipped into the church through a back door and was hiding, but he hadn't come. Jack returned to his car, and sipped on coffee as he watched.

Davy had apparently started crying at one point, because Peter appeared outside with him about twenty minutes after the service began. Jack could hear the baby begin to wail again, as his father tried to soothe him. Then Peter's mother came outside and handed Peter a bottle. Davy cried a little more as his father tried to get him interested in sucking it, but soon the baby settled down and the Carlson family went inside.

Jack had never seriously thought about having kids. None of his girlfriends had stuck around long enough for that topic to even be brought up. Well, not brought up with him, at any rate. Maybe they'd assessed him for potential husband and daddy duty and decided to cut him loose because he didn't measure up to their standards.

He thought that John would have made a good father from the way he'd fussed over Jack when he was hurt and by the way he acted in a quiet, calm manner most of the time. Except when he turned into the Hulk, of course.

Even when he was being ferocious, John wouldn't hurt a child. He'd interviewed an abused kid who had seen John turn into the Hulk, and the Hulk had been as protective about the boy as the boy had been about the man who'd transformed in front of him. The Hulk had snatched a baby once, but it turned out that John had done it to save the kid from being abandoned by the mother's crazy brother-in-law. He'd interviewed the mother after she had settled in with an aunt; she had been disbelieving at first that John actually was the Hulk, but he'd seen enlightenment cross her face finally. She told him how the Hulk had taken her kid, but that John had brought him back. The baby had been unharmed; the Hulk had saved his life.

Dr. David Banner's wife had been killed in a car accident. He suspected that they had planned to have children. David Banner had been a good man. Jack had investigated him when he'd written an article on the two people the Hulk had killed. He would have been a good father, as he was known for his kindness to others and for giving a helping hand where it was needed.

Jack's father had been a good man, too. He'd always been a soft touch and had run every business he'd tried to make a living at into the ground because of it. He'd helped a lot of people, but his father had also been taken advantage of by some who weren't in genuine need. Jack had grown up leery of other's motivations because of seeing his dad flim-flammed. Being suspicious of others made him a good reporter, he knew. He didn't just buy what people tried to sell him.

Sometimes he wished he was more like his father, though. Maybe he'd sleep better at night.

x x x

Jack had just about given up waiting for John to appear at the Banner family cemetery. The small graveyard, with its modest headstones was tucked away on the outskirt of the family farm. He finally heard the sound of someone walking quietly down the road, and he felt his body tighten up with tension. Jack was well-hidden part way up a hill and had brought supplies for a lengthy surveillance. He saw birds startling into the twilight; alerted, he trained his binoculars on the road and wasn't disappointed to see the silhouette of a slender man approaching.

The man stopped on the road, his features unreadable to Jack in the dusk. He just stood there looking toward the two graves rounded with dirt, covered in flowers. In sudden empathy, Jack understood that John didn't want to take one step off that road.

Jack heard the sound of a pickup truck, the lack of muffler identifying it to Jack as the same one that had been tearing up and down the road over the last two hours. He suspected that the inhabitants, a couple of rowdy guys with excellent vocal chords and a habit of half hanging out the truck window, yelling, "Whoo-hoo," had been drinking. They'd thrown a few cans of something out the window a couple of times as they'd torn past the graveyard.

John moved a few feet onto the edge of the grass as the truck roared down the road, music blaring from the open windows. Before the truck reached John, though, it started to swerve. Another can flew out the window and Jack watched in horror as the truck straddled the shoulder and the road, the driver losing control. John scrambled to get out of the way, but he stumbled and the truck clipped him as it sped by.

Jack dropped the binoculars and ran, tripping over vegetation. By the time he reached the bottom of the hill, John's body was shaking, his legs growing, pants splitting, boots peeling off his feet, his skin turning green. The Hulk stood up, tall and as menacing as ever, and threw the remains of John's shirt and jacket from him. He stepped out on the road and clenched his fists and roared in the direction of the truck.

Jack ran to the edge of the road, and looked for the truck. He could barely see its tail lights. The Hulk started to run down the road after it, then slowed to a stop. He turned, and Jack watched, mouth dry, as the Hulk took one slow step after another until he'd passed Jack and stood in front of the two graves.

Jack moved quietly closer while the Hulk's attention was focused on Helen's and Mr. Banner's graves. He loaded his tranquilizer gun with the special dart to incapacitate the Hulk's huge body.

The Hulk roared again, and fell to his knees. He pounded the ground next to the graves, and Jack could hear pain in the sound. God. So much pain. He carefully put the gun into his jacket pocket and moved painstakingly closer to the monster he'd been chasing for so many years. He was near enough now that he could see that the Hulk was crying, tear tracks glistening on his cheeks.

The Hulk was crying.

Jack couldn't shoot the Hulk while he was crumpled like this, grieving. He just couldn't.

He took one slow step after another until he was within arm's reach of the Hulk. He said softly, "John."

The Hulk looked at him, misery and bewilderment in his expression.

Jack reached out and patted him on the shoulder. "John, I'm sorry. I'm not sure who they were to you, but I can see that you loved them."

He kept his hand on that hot, green skin, and the Hulk wept.

x x x

Jack lost track of time, but it had been fully dark for a while before the Hulk finally moved. He crouched down in front of each grave and laid a massive hand on top of each headstone, and then moved over to an older grave, and delicately traced the inscription. Jack took out a small flashlight and shined it on the gravestone. The mother, Mr. Banner's wife, was buried here. She'd died when David and Helen were just little kids.

The Hulk gave a huge sigh. He started trudging away, towards a hill at the edge of the graveyard. Jack started following very close behind him, and the Hulk turned around and gave Jack one of those long looks. He wasn't angry; he looked lost. And very tired. The Hulk was going to change back soon, Jack just knew it.

On impulse, he held out his hand and after a moment the Hulk took it. They walked hand in hand, man and creature, and the Hulk found a path that led up the hillside. Jack shone his flashlight ahead, although he suspected that John didn't need it.

The terrain grew steeper until the Hulk brought them to a little clearing that had once been a children's play yard. There was still the remains of a tire swing on the ground. He dropped down heavily on a long rock that served him as a bench, and Jack sat down next to him, barely breathing.

It was going to happen. It was really going to happen at last. He was going to see the true face of the Hulk, of his John Doe.

The Hulk looked at him again, his eyes going wide and dazed. Jack squeezed his hand. "It's all right, John. It's all right." The Hulk shut his eyes and swayed a little.

The hand in his began shrinking. John's skin lightened. His hair began changing from the crazy looking brushy mop to John's normal curly, wavy, dark brown hair. His face became smaller, the brutish look, the bushy eyebrows, all melting away.

Jack held his breath. He brought the flashlight up, cupping his fingers over the end so that the light was diluted. He didn't want to blind John.

John let go of Jack's hand and put both hands up over his face, touching his altered skin. He breathed deeply, and the last of the green tinge faded from his much smaller frame.

Jack brought up the light and saw that while John's face was mostly hidden by his hands, his eyes weren't. The irises were changing, from a pale green to white to a deep gray hue. He looked dazed, shivered hard.

Jack put his arm around John's shoulders and with his free hand, he gently pulled John's hands, one at a time, away from his face. He picked up the flashlight he'd laid down on the rock and carefully used it to light up John's face.

What he saw made his heart stutter. It couldn't be, it couldn't be! The flashlight fell from his hand.

Jack had chased this man all over the country and Mexico. He'd banked on John Doe's story being his ticket to a Pulitzer and to getting his column back. Jack's arm tightened around John's shoulders, and his friend looked at him without any true understanding that Jack had recognized him.

Jack's heart was beating too hard, too fast. His hands were tingling and he couldn't get his breath. He felt terrified, and everything was so, so wrong.

He wanted to run away and he wanted to crawl into a hole and never emerge and he wanted to hug the man next to him and whisper to him over and over and over that he was sorry.

He was so damned sorry.

He couldn't even get enough breath to say this man's, this poor son-of-a-bitch's name. Jack, suffocating, because all the air on this steep hillside had evaporated, clung to John and watched the awareness of what was happening come back into those puzzled eyes.

Only he wasn't John Doe anymore. God.

He looked into David Banner's resigned eyes, and it was the saddest goddamn thing he'd ever seen.

Then Doctor Banner said in the same firm tone he'd used after the plane crash had left Jack with a broken leg, "Jack, you're having a panic attack. Put your hands in front of your mouth and breathe through them. You're going to slow down your breathing now. Do what I say and you'll be able to catch your breath."

He took Jack's hands and cupped them in front of Jack's mouth and held them there and told him when to breathe and counted out a rhythm for Jack's exhalations.

Slowly, slowly, Jack started to feel like he wasn't dying anymore. John, no, David started rubbing Jack's back, still counting a rhythm for Jack to breathe by.

God, this was what he'd been hiding from himself. He'd been afraid to voice what all the damned clues had been pointing at, starting with how Banner's body had never been found. Jack had testified that he'd witnessed David Banner running back into the burning building and not coming back out. It was his fault that Banner had been declared dead. Jack's sighting of the Hulk carrying Elaina Marks had resulted in the creature being wanted for questioning in her's and David Banner's deaths.

Jack McGee had been the reason that David left his home and career and became a fugitive. It was his fault that this man, this kind and compassionate man, had gone hungry and slept on benches and been hurt who knows how many times.

He'd made it his personal crusade to hunt down the Hulk, and every time he showed up after a Hulk appearance, John, no, David had to run again.

David. He deserved to be called by his real name. All those aliases where David had used his real first name, and a last name that started with a "B," maybe he'd been holding onto the last bit of who he was and not think of himself as just a nameless drifter.

"Are you feeling better yet, Jack?" David shivered in the cool night air of Colorado in October, and Jack took one last deep breath and stood up.

He pulled off his jacket and offered it to David. Now that he wasn't providing medical care, David looked up at him with trepidation and exhaustion. He was holding himself so still, as if he would shatter if he moved.

"Put it on, David. You're cold." When David made no move to take it, Jacadded, "Please. John, uh, David. Please. I can only guess what you're thinking right now, but I'm not your enemy. I only want to help you."

David's glance was full of despair. "I know," he said softly. "You've been telling me for years that my capture would get me the help I need."

Jack nodded frantically. "Let me help you."

David looked at him for a long, long moment, and Jack saw some of the Hulk's bewildered expression in that gaze.

"Jack, I'm not going to just let you take me to the police, although to be honest, sometimes I think I belong in jail. But I know that being locked up would only make things worse."

"You're alive. I can't believe that you're alive."

David shivered. "You know my secret now. This time tomorrow I expect that it will be the top story for the National Register."

"No, Jo-, David, I-"

"But for all the reasons I told you before, I'm afraid to turn myself in."

"David, I won't tell anyone you're... him. Not the police. You aren't wanted by the government or the army, but I'll keep my mouth shut if they ask me about you."

David made a sound that tried to be a laugh, but failed miserably. "Jack, I become a loathsome creature. The government was ready to study aliens; I'm betting that by now there's a research group looking for me, to study this mutation."

"But... maybe they could figure it out and help you." Jack wasn't sure he even believed that anymore.

"I'm afraid I'll just be a walking weapon to them. A mindless angry bomb they can re-create or point at an enemy." David wrapped his arms around his chest and huddled in on himself.

"J-David, the Hulk isn't loathsome or mindless. You don't remember what happens when you change, do you? He cried. You cried, down at the cemetery. For your... sister and father. David, I'm so sorry for your loss."

He sat down again next to David and put the jacket around his shoulders. David glanced at him, and Jack read the refusal in his face. Then the corner of his mouth made a wry gesture, and he shrugged it on. David crossed his arms again, tucking his hands tight against himself. The look he gave Jack was so hopeless, so sad. Jack put an arm around him and drew him close.

David let him. How beaten down David must be feeling, to accept comfort from the man who'd made his life miserable.

"David, I promise that I'm not going to write the story."

"You've been waiting for years to write it, Jack."

"No. I'm responsible for what happened to you. I made you a fugitive, and I'm so sorry. I told the police that the Hulk was a killer. The Hulk didn't kill Elaina Marks, I believe you now about that."

"Mmm-hmmm."

"You experimented on yourself, and something very bad happened, didn't it? It changed you."

David pushed away from Jack a little and shook his head. "What happened to me was my fault, not yours. I wanted. I wanted so many things, and I had the hubris to force a change upon my own body to prove my theory. At least the lab fire destroyed my notes, and with Elaina gone there isn't anybody else who knows what exactly I'd been so obsessed with researching. Except, I guess, Fletcher. He must have taken the tapes out of my bag and kept them."

"What were you trying to prove? I know it has something to do with the sun." Jack thought about the lab in the old Clive house and the strange machinery that had opened to the sky.

David shook his head. "I don't trust you with that knowledge, Jack. And right now, with the shock of finding out who I really am, you're making promises that I don't think you can keep."

"I give you my word that-"

"Once you go back to Chicago, you'll change your mind. This is your Holy Grail, remember? Your way off the Register. The temptation will be too strong and you'll give me up."

"I won't. David, I won't."

David closed his eyes for a moment. "You told me once that if you had to choose between the other guy and you, you wouldn't pick the other guy. I'm the other guy, remember?"

"I take it back, okay. I'm picking you."

David said, "I don't believe you. But I'm warning you, if you try to make me your prisoner, I'll fight you. Please, please, don't make me risk bringing out the creature in me."

"I can't ask you to trust me, well I can ask, but it's pretty clear that you won't do that, but I won't hurt you, J- David. This changes everything, don't you see? I went after you because I thought you were a killer."

"You thought I was lying to myself."

"I swear, I won't try to capture you any more. You can walk away whenever you want. Reach in my jacket pocket, but be careful. There's a tranquilizer gun in there and I'm giving it to you. Shoot me with it, or throw it away, it's all I've got to show you I mean what I'm saying."

David shook his head, a small gesture of disbelief, but brought the gun out of his pocket and stared at it.

"Are you still using curare?"

"Yes. I've been assured that it won't hurt you."

"Uh-huh. Tell me, Jack, are you willing to risk your own life on those assurances?" David held the gun in his lap and looked sternly at him.

This was David Banner, John Doe, and Jack made a leap of faith.

"I would risk it, but you won't. You won't even point the gun at me, in case it might go off accidentally."

David sighed, and tossed the dart gun down on the ground.

"Curare is dangerous, Jack. Too much, and the lungs stop working. I really doubt that you've had the dosage right for me or the Hulk. If you had accidentally gotten some in a cut or the dart slipped and you stabbed yourself, you could have died. Please, if you change your mind and start hunting me again, get something that won't kill either you or me."

David sighed again and drew his bare legs up, wrapping his arms around them, the tattered remains of his pants hanging loosely, no protection from the cold and the breeze. He laid his head on his knees.

"What now, Jack? My sister and father were buried today, and I haven't slept in, oh... probably forty hours. Are you going to call the police and tell them I'm alive?"

"No."

"It's not a crime to disappear and let people think you're dead. Unless you commit fraud, and I haven't done that. My life insurance policy lapsed after Laura died and I didn't renew it. Nothing was paid out. I let a lot of stuff slide; the only thing that I focused on was my research."

He stared at Jack, lost in thought again. Jack kept very still, feeling like he had approached something wild. If he just kept quiet, then the wild thing might accept him, trust him.

Finally David said, "If you tell them I'm the Hulk and I'm picked up by the police then I expect they'll keep me for questioning about the lab fire, but it was an accident."

"David, I-"

"From what I was able to learn, it started in a supply closet. The chemicals in there were improperly stored. The Hulk, well, me, we, I, neither of us set the fire. The evidence will show that."

"The Hulk was still wanted as person of interest, last I checked."

David shrugged. "Maybe they'll still try me for Elaina's death, I don't know. And maybe I'll be arrested for destroying a lot of property, vandalizing places. I know I've shoved and tossed people who were trying to hurt me or somebody else. I guess charges could be brought about that, if any of those people wanted revenge. But regardless, once I'm on the government's radar they're going to want to take me into custody to study."

"You don't know that about the government, but would it truly be a bad thing to have some of the country's smartest people trying to cure you? They could give you a safe place to live, protect you."

David shook his head. "They won't want to cure me, they'll want to use me to make soldiers more powerful. Super soldiers, Jack. I don't want that on my conscience."

"You're sounding a little paranoid, David."

"After being in that underground research center for studying aliens and being chased by the country's most persistent reporter for years, I'm entitled. You're an investigative reporter. You were nosy enough to get inside the alien research center, why don't you sniff around and see if something has been set up to study mutants or monsters."

"Prometheus. That program was called Prometheus. It's still very classified. Maybe I will check around, though, see if mutants and monsters are on the menu now."

"Well, thank you for that."

"David, come back with me to my motel room. You're exhausted, you need to sleep. I swear I won't call the cops. It's a little overdramatic, but you remember me talking about my Pop being a good man, a lot different from me? Well, I swear on his memory."

"Mmm." David lifted his head and looked around. "This is our special place where Helen and I used to come when we were kids. We pledged to always help each other if we were in trouble." He made a small sound, partly a troubled laugh and partly a sob. "Oh, God, I've been in so much trouble since Laura died." He hugged himself tighter, holding himself so still, so tense and wary.

"Let me help you. Please, David, at least let me give you a bed to sleep in tonight, get you something to eat." Jack laid a hand on David's leg, felt the cool skin. "If you don't have any more clothes with you in that bag you were carrying, I'll give you mine. Do you need money? Are you hurt from the truck hitting you?"

"I'm sore, but nothing's broken. Jack, I shouldn't go with you. I shouldn't even be sitting here. I should be running away, but I'm tired."

Jack put his arm around him.

"I'm so tired of everything, Jack."

Jack turned a little and wrapped fingers around the other man's calloused, rough hand. David didn't pull away, though. Instead, he tightened his own hand around Jack's fingers.

David said, a hitch in his voice, "Helen's gone, my father, Laura, Elaina, Carolyn, everybody that I've loved, all my family, they're all dead. Sometimes I wish I was, too. It would keep the creature from destroying any more of my life."

David stared at Jack for a long duration, his thoughts somewhere else. Jack had seen that expression on the Hulk's face earlier this evening, at the cemetery. David Banner was lost. Drifting, rootless, nothing to anchor him except the hope of a cure, and right now he didn't sound like that was enough. Was he even still trying to find a way of getting rid of the Hulk?

"You're not the last of your family. What about Davy?"

"I'll never get to know Helen's son. I'll never be able to hold him, watch him grow up."

"David, you can't give up hope. That's just not you, not the guy who hauled me up and down a mountain and kept me from giving up. It's my turn now, and you're coming with me. I won't stop you if you try to leave, but I hope you won't run. Not tonight, not when you're so beat. C'mon."

He stood up and held out a hand, hoping that David would take it willingly. But if not, he'd haul him up by an arm and hustle him down this hill and into his car. He'd take him to the motel and put him to bed. He didn't think David would fight him on that. No. He wouldn't bully David into being taken care of, even if it was what David needed. But he really hoped David would trust him enough to take his hand and cooperate.

David looked up at him, exhaustion smeared across his features."You swear on your father's name that you won't call the police or turn me in tonight?"

"I swear it." Jack waited, and David looked hard at him, muscles tensing to jump up and run, then they seemed to deflate; he seemed smaller, vulnerable again.

"You finally caught me," he said, as grasped Jack's hand. Jack helped him up. When David started to sway, he put an arm around his waist, steadying him against his own body.

"I did. And now I've joined the club." Jack picked up the gun and put it in his pocket, not wanting somebody to find it and poison themselves. They started to descend, careful of David's bare feet, the flashlight pointing the way.

David stumbled and Jack caught him. David didn't pull away when Jack pulled him closer to him. Jack let him rest, his weight against Jack.

"What club?"

"The David Banner one. It's one I kept running into when I was searching for you. Everybody in it was looking out for you by misdirecting me, or by outright denying knowledge of you. You have a way about you, Doctor Banner."

David made a disbelieving sound.

"You do. People want to protect your secret, or if they don't know about the Hulk, they just want to make sure the nosy reporter can't harass you. You've left a trail of friends behind you, if you didn't know. Even Fletcher, and he was desperate for a good story to redeem his career."

"I... I don't usually go back or call the people I've met. It's just too hard. I have to live in the present. It's mostly in dreams that I think about the past."

"Good dreams, I hope?" Jack doubted it, though.

"No. Not usually." David said, and Jack felt him shivering.

"You've been so alone, haven't you?"

David whispered yes, so low that Jack almost didn't catch it, even though he was as close to him as he could possibly be.

David said, a little louder, "I didn't see my sister and dad for three years after they thought I'd died. I promised to call them once a month, though, after I came back here a couple of years ago. It was how I learned about Helen's and Dad's deaths."

"Ah, I wondered if John Doe would find out. Your brother-in-law called me; your dad had kept my card in his address book and Peter was calling everyone about the news."

"My sister really loved him. They had such a short time..." David took a deep breath. "Jack, you need to know that sometimes I have nightmares and I change. I don't realize it's even happening, because I'm asleep. Still want me to share your room tonight?"

"I'm not letting you sleep on a bench or in a phone booth or curled up in an alley somewhere. You don't have the money for a room, right?"

David looked down at his feet. "No."

"Thought so. You would have mentioned it already, if you had. I think that the Hulk and I have an understanding. As long as I'm not trying to shoot him with the dart gun, he seems to trust me. You seem to trust me. I'll just try to calm him down and if he runs off, I'll follow him and take care of you when you change back. Ready to keep walking now?"

David nodded, and Jack stepped away from him. They made their way back to the cemetery without any more conversation between them.

David stopped at the graves, and knelt. Jack gave him some privacy and found David's bag and collected up his own stuff. He spent some time looking up at the stars, thinking about how much he'd made this man's life miserable over the last six years. After a half-hour had gone by, he slowly walked over to where David was slumped on the ground. He laid his hand on David's shoulder, the same way that he'd touched the Hulk. David, tear stains on his face, breath hitching, looked up and nodded. Jack helped him up, and David ran his hand over the gravestones of his father, sister, and mother the same way the Hulk had done.

Jack shouldered David's bag and together they walked to where Jack's car was hidden next to a gravel lane a bit further down the road. They were silent on the ride back to the motel; David's eyes were red and he mostly stared out the window. Jack wondered if he was remembering growing up a farm boy and climbing these hills, fishing the creeks and rivers. From what he'd gathered, David liked the woods and fishing. He'd spent months camping down in Mexico before Jack had tracked him there.

At his cheap motel, Jack went in and dropped David's bag on the bed. David stood in the doorway. He looked wrecked. The jacket Jack had given him was only partly buttoned, David's bare skin still visible. His jeans were in tatters and he was barefoot. Jack could read the uncertainty in his expression.

Jack caught David's eye and said, with as much conviction in his voice as he could, "I gave my word, and if you've learned anything about me at all over the last six years, I hope you've learned that I keep it. You're safe, David. I'm going to let you get cleaned up and if you need any other clothes, help yourself to mine. I'm going out for a food run. If you leave, I won't chase you. It's up to you. I'm taking the key with me, so lock the door, okay?"

He picked up his door and car keys and David stepped into the room. He gave Jack another one of those searching looks, and Jack smiled wryly at him before shutting the door.

David would either be here when he got back, or he'd be in the wind again. Either way, Jack would keep his word. He wouldn't call the cops or announce to the world that Doctor David Banner was the Hulk.

x x x

He wasn't gone long. Treverton had a Wendy's still open and he went through the drive-thru, picking up a couple of burgers, fries, and cokes. Returning, he knocked on the door and then unlocked it; when he saw the empty room, he sighed and put the bag of food and the drinks down on the desk in the corner of the room. So David had decided not to trust him.

Then he noticed the sound of the shower running, and he blew out a long breath. He turned on the news and sat down on the bed, idly taking in today's headlines. An Arab delegation and President Reagan just wound up six days of talking about peace in the Middle East, and the Epcot center in Florida had held its grand opening. Old Mickey Mouse had come a long way since the days of Steamboat Willie, he thought.

He turned the TV off when he heard David unlocking the bathroom door. Their eyes met when David stepped out of the bathroom, still toweling his hair dry. He had on a white T-shirt and gray sweatpants, and his feet were bare.

The room was chilly, and Jack frowned. David said, "I don't have to wear your stuff, Jack. I was just saving my other jeans and shirt for tomorrow, but I can change into them now."

"No. No, it's fine. I told you that you could borrow anything you wanted, remember? No, I was wondering if you're warm enough. I've got a sweatshirt you can wear. Or a flannel shirt."

David stepped back into the bathroom and hung up the towel; Jack threw him a dark blue flannel shirt and a pair of socks when he returned. "Here. You make me cold just looking at you. I got us some burgers and fries. Hope you eat red meat."

"I'm not picky. Thanks." He put on the flannel shirt and buttoned it up; it was big on him and Jack compared David to his memories of the first time he'd met Doctor David Banner. David was thinner than he'd been six years ago. He'd been on the slender side even back then, but Jack guessed he'd lost another twenty pounds or so. David brought the socks over to the desk and sat down in the chair, pulled them on. Jack divided up the food and they ate without talking.

David looked a little better than he had on the drive to the motel, but his eyes were drooping. His hair was curlier than normal, since it was uncombed, and Jack wanted to touch it, run his fingers through it.

David threw away their trash, and then he looked at the bed. "Jack I'm not going to kick you out of your bed. I'll sleep on the floor."

"No, you aren't. If you don't want me in it, then I'll sleep on the floor. Don't argue with me about this. I owe you so much, and giving you my bed doesn't even put a dent in it."

David glanced at him, then dropped his eyes to Jack's shoulder. "I don't want-"

"I get it, David-"

"To have sex, I-"

"I wouldn't expect that from you, especially not tonight—"

"Feel kind of hollowed out, and I haven't had to-"

"Jesus, David, your family was buried today, but I wouldn't ask-"

"Trade sex for things I need, not yet."

"You to pay me with sex at anytime, understand. I'm your friend; there's no strings attached, okay?"

David nodded, smiled a little. It stung Jack, made his heart want to break into tiny pieces.

Jack asked, diffidently, "So, do you want to sleep alone or do you want company?"

"Umm. Company. And I think I'm going to try to sleep, all right? I'm so tired."

Then Jack's curiosity got the better of him. "Have you been propositioned, for pay or for rides?"

David made a face, like he didn't quite get it, and said, "Oh, yes."

"While you're hitchhiking?"

"Mm-hm."

"In return for being offered a job?"

"I would find other jobs."

"For clothes, food?"

"I went hungry."

"If you ever, ever find yourself in trouble like that, you call me and I'll wire you money."

"Jack, I'm not your responsibility. Stop worrying about me, I'll be okay. To tell you the truth, I'm always surprised when somebody wants to swap sex for whatever they're trading. I'm just... me."

Jack shook his head. "Of course you don't get it. Just take my word for it, David Banner. You're a good-looking guy and sexy as hell. Of course people who see you, meet you, want to sleep with you. I did."

"You didn't even know what I looked like, Jack."

"I could tell you were attractive, but I don't try to sleep with every good-looking guy I meet. I don't sleep with many men or women at all. You, your, oh, I don't know, your soul, your personality, just you being you, even when you didn't have a clue about who you were, well, I just wanted you when we were on that mountain."

David made another wordless, unsettled murmur.

Jack assured him, his voice gentle, "Look, I'm not going to try to seduce you or anything like that. I just want you to feel safe and to get some rest. Okay?"

"Okay." He smiled ruefully at Jack, and Jack knew he was in deep, deep trouble. He was afraid he was falling head over heels in love with this beautiful, damaged man.

x x x

Jack quietly left the bathroom and stole a look at David. He was in bed, and his eyes were closed. On an impulse, Jack pulled the loose gold chain over his head and held the St. Christopher's medal in his hand. He hoped that David would come with him in the morning, but if he went back to running... David didn't stir when Jack slipped the medal that his mother had given him, plus two hundred dollars, into David's bag, zipping it into an internal pocket.

David was almost asleep when Jack turned out the lights and slid into bed, his own skin damp from the quick shower he'd taken. He often slept naked, but for tonight he wore boxers and a sleeveless T-shirt. David had stripped down to just a T-shirt and boxers, too, folding the shirt, sweatpants, and socks, leaving them neatly on top of his bag.

Jack lay on his back in the dark, the only light in the room a line at the top of the curtains, edging in from the outside motel lights. David rolled over from his back to his side, facing him, his eyes shut. Jack startled a little when David found Jack's fingers, bringing Jack's hand up to his chest. Within moments, David's breathing had settled into the rhythm of sleep. Jack rolled a little closer to him, so that his arm was more comfortable. His last thoughts before sliding into sleep were of how Mark would be more than happy to drop the weekly Hulk report and to stop shelling out for Jack to travel around the country, chasing after Hulk sightings.

x x x

Sometime early in the morning, before the sun had risen, David woke him up. He was crying in his sleep, sobs shaking his body. Jack sat up quickly, and turned on the bedside light. If David was changing, he wanted some warning.

But David hadn't reached that point yet, his skin was flushed but not green, his hair mussed but not the rougher hair of the Hulk.

"David, wake up." He cautiously shook his shoulder, but David didn't open his eyes. He was sobbing, like a little kid sobs, and he knew David would be embarrassed if he knew he was crying like this.

He pulled David against him, rocking him, and shushing him, rubbing his back and hoping that either David would stop crying and go back to sleep, or that he'd just stop those heart-rending sounds before he woke up. He didn't mind holding David like this; the guy had lost so much, and the recent deaths probably brought back memories of his wife Laura and whoever Carolyn had been. He'd called out for Carolyn when they'd been on the mountain, he remembered.

He lucked out. David's sobs dwindled off and his breathing changed back to the slow deep breaths that meant he was still deeply asleep. Jack arranged pillows behind his back and head and turned the light back off. He kept David sprawled against him, though. The increased body contact seemed to have comforted him, and it was little enough to give this man.

Jack fell back asleep eventually, and when he woke it was past ten o'clock. He sat up and glanced around the room. When he saw that David's bag was gone, he slumped back against the pillows. He couldn't in all honesty say he was surprised.

There was a note for him, and he read the words thanking him for last night – and telling him goodbye.

Jack packed up his things, including the clothes David had borrowed from him, and checked out of the motel. He didn't know if he'd ever see David Banner again.