TW:TIH
With the tense atmosphere from the fight draining away, M'gann and Wally got up to storm the kitchen to restock their snack supplies while a few others headed out for a bathroom break or just to stretch the kinks out of their bodies.
It was during this lull that Oliver's phone rang, prompting him to excuse himself from the group.
"What's up?"
"Did you even look at the phone before picking the call?"
"Hey babe," He smiled as he leaned on the doorway. "Now why would I want to do that when the alternative's being surprised by your voice?"
"I swear, listening to you spin such bullshit, I can actually understand how you got in and out of so many women's beds."
"The stupidity of my youth," He sighed. He knew she wasn't accusing him in anyway -they were well past all that at this point- but with maturity came a sense of regret regarding the many women he had slept with. The only reason he could deal with his regrets was that the relationships were always consensual. "So, how's it hanging over at Wayne Manor?"
"Well, Clark and I are trying our best. We don't want to push him too hard but we're making sure that he doesn't run away from all this." He heard her sigh and he could almost picture her running her hand through her hair. "As usual, Alfred's the one who's really pushing things forward: he knows Bruce so much better than any of us so we're just playing off whatever he does."
"Ah… well you guys are missing quite a bit here," Oliver stated, gesturing for Dick to hold off on continuing the movie. "We're watching the next movie -just past a pretty intense fight, in fact- and we're about to kick things off again."
"Well lucky you," This time, he could almost hear her eyes rolling. "I guess I shouldn't keep you waiting then?"
"Dick and the others would probably appreciate that, yeah." He chuckled as he walked back to the others. "Give our regards to the guys?"
"Of course. Love you."
"Love you too, babe." Just before he clicked off, he heard her say something. "I didn't quite catch that."
"I was asking about the movie you guys are watching."
"Oh? What about it?"
"I was wondering… it wouldn't happen to be The Incredible Hulk would it?"
The last thing he heard before the line clicked off was her laughter.
"Those smug…."
"Something wrong?" Diana asked, ignoring the clearly impatient teenagers around her.
"I… I think Alfred, Bruce, Clark and Dinah are having a little private watching of their own." He said as he took his spot beside the Amazon. "Dinah just told me the title of the movie we're watching."
"Wait. Really?" Artemis blinked. "Didn't we just learn about that…" She stopped and turned to a clearly squirming Dick. "You didn't."
"Canary asked me to send her a digital copy of the movie two days ago," the young man admitted. "She wants to get Bruce back into being comfortable with our movie club -her words- so we can all watch the next one together."
"I want to be a bit upset about this but…" Conner sighed. "It's for a good cause so I really can't."
"Besides," Wally added, coming to his friend's defence. "Since we're watching it now and their therapy session didn't get to meet until today either then we have no spoiler risks right?"
"Let's get this going then," M'gann said as she quickly hit the play button.
59:22 - 59:55
"Okay, that was funny," Zatanna snorted as they watched the Hulk stand at the mouth of the cave after getting kicked in the mug by the frightened woman. "I can almost hear him thinking 'I saved her and I get kicked in the face! Women!' with that stance."
"I can't blame her for her reaction, though." Conner said. "Waking up to his face after getting knocked out in a huge explosion-"
"Not to mention that particularly well-timed flash of lightning," Raquel added.
"That too," Conner nodded. "It all makes for a very jarring wake-up call for Doctor Ross."
"Still… that reaction is quite controlled for the Hulk," Diana noted. "I must confess that, after everything we just saw at the Campus…"
"You thought the Hulk would simply smash her-" J'onn ignored Oliver's immature snicker. "- for reacting like that?"
"To be honest, I thought the same thing." John admitted.
"Then you have not fully comprehended the way this creature's mind works." The Martian replied. "To both this creature and Doctor Banner, Elizabeth Ross is more important than life. For her, they would do anything, take any form of punishment. With a mindset like that, a few kicks from her are of no consequence. The only thing she could do to hurt them is to reject them."
"That… that makes sense," Barry nodded as M'gann hit the play button.
59:55 - 1:00:00
"You know…" Dick started, "looking at him like this…"
"He looks completely different from the rage monster we just saw," Oliver finished quietly. "The look in his eyes show how much he cares for her."
"It also shows how vulnerable he is," Kara added. "I'm pretty sure if Betty screamed at him to leave, he'd just walk away without a second thought."
"Well, he might knock her out first-"
"Dude!" Artemis stared bug-eyed at the Kryptonian. "Why would you ever think-"
"Maybe if I could finish what I was saying first?" Conner interrupted her stare with a flat gaze of his own. When the blonde threw her hands up in surrender -but didn't drop her stare- he continued, "I was saying the Hulk might knock her out so he could drop her off somewhere close to town. I mean, I can't imagine how she would go about making her way out of some cave in a forested canyon all by herself."
"She might be able to make it out on her own but it sure as heck wouldn't be easy," Raquel agreed, seeing the sense in his words. "Plus, I think she dropped her bag off so even if she did make it out, she'd be stuck in the middle of nowhere without a way to connect to civilization."
"But does he really have to knock her out?" Zatanna asked, a tad uncomfortable with the idea of the Hulk laying those meaty clubs of his on Elizabeth. "I mean, maybe-"
"Trust me on this one, I've had to ferry… disagreeable civilians around a number of times and the experience is not all it's cracked up to be," Barry's scowl was mirrored to a lesser extent on both Kara and Conner's faces. "The only thing that makes it even mildly tolerable is the fact that I suffer all the screaming and back pounding for less than three seconds. If I had to go leaping through forests and canyons to return a grouchy lump back to civilization with a huge target on my back I'd definitely knock them out before got started."
"I guess when you put it that way…"
1:00:00 - 1:00:38
"Aw… That's kinda sweet," Zatanna cooed at the scene onscreen. "I mean, he's obviously overreacting and being kinda overprotective-"
"Only because you are seeing this from a privileged view," Diana rebuked gently. "If you were to put yourself in the Hulk's shoes, you would see that his reactions are a symptom of-"
"PTSD," Oliver, Dick and John stated with varying degrees of grimaces. John continued: "Remember when Banner had that nightmare of a dead Betty? That was a day or two after the heat from Ross' attempt had cooled off. This time, the memories are still extremely fresh -less than twelve hours, if I had to guess- and if a guy like Banner could have those flashes from a simple sputtering engine, imagine what the rumble of thunder would sound like to a creature as instinctive as the Hulk."
"He's not overreacting," Dick summarized. "After what happened to her on the Campus, the Hulk genuinely believes there might be danger across the horizon and he would rather take on the weight of the world than watch her suffer a single scratch."
"Sometimes I wonder precisely how much of the Hulk is Doctor Banner and vice-versa," Kaldur sighed. "But times like these have me believe they are one and the same."
1:00:39 - 1:00:47
"Damn," Barry muttered to Kara, though everyone present heard him. "I mean, I know we've said already but she could literally ask him to die for her and he'd all too readily do it."
"Makes me grateful she's not on her dad's side," Kara agreed with a little shudder. "I mean, can you imagine the aftermath if she betrayed him and he somehow survived?"
"It'd be a blood bath." The speedster agreed.*
1:00:48 - 1:01:42
"Well, talk about the Beauty and the Beast, huh?" Conner commented as he pulled M'gann a bit closer to his side. "Too bad he didn't have a jacket, though; he looked really down when he saw her shiver."
Raquel nodded her agreement. "I mean, it might be an annoying romantic-movie trope but in this scene, I might actually have excused it."
"Eh, they'll just switch to the 'sharing body heat' trope," Artemis shrugged. "I mean, considering how fast his heart rate is implied to be, his body's got to be a mini-furnace right?"
When everyone turned to Raquel, Wally and Dick for their opinions, the three stared back dully.
"You guys realize that I'm more into physics and stuff than anything biological right?" Raquel replied, followed by Wally's "Aspiring Chemist here!" and Dick's "IT genius, not Frankenstein's assistant, thank you very much."
"It's not like we don't have a clue about what Artemis is saying," Raquel continued, "It's just… how are we even sure the general laws of biology still work with something that can drastically alter it's size-"
"And mass," Wally added and Raquel nodded to him.
"-and mass- at will?" She concluded. "The fact is, it's a lot easier to throw around theories based on physics and chemistry; when it comes to biology, though, there's just so many levels to that."
"Okay, that sounds reasonable," Kara nodded before turning to Barry. "Well, you're the adult genius here and you have a decent background in biology thanks to your CSI job: what do you think?"
Barry's look was, incredibly, even duller than the teenagers'. "Really Kara?"
"I mean, she's right; you do have the background and a bit of experience dealing with metas." Oliver shrugged. "You think Hulkyboy's got a higher than normal body temp?"
The elder speedster turned pleading eyes to the ceiling before sighing. "Okay, my best guess -and don't you dare ask me to explain because I won't- is yes: the Hulk likely has a higher than normal body temperature. Not hot enough to be a huge anomaly -which is obvious since he isn't steaming the water off his skin and Betty felt no discomfort touching him- but not normal either. Satisfied?"
"Would you explain it if I said no?" The speedster just crossed his arms and stared pointedly at the TV, making Kara sigh theatrically. "Alright, I guess we can move on."
1:01:42 - 1:01:50
"No way…" Dick breathed softly, voicing the thoughts of a dumbfounded Diana, Oliver and John. "That's not possible-"
"Babe?" His girlfriend turned to him with a concerned frown. "Richard what's going on?"
"Uh, Zee?" Artemis called, her hushed voice filled with an almost sickened awe. "You might want to see this."
1:01:50 - 1:02:24
"What the fff-" Zatanna choked on a horrified gasp as she stared at the broken shell of a man lying on the gurney.
The broken shell that had just snapped his eyes open.
"How in the hells is he alive?!"
"I can't even imagine the damage he suffered here," A sour faced Barry said. He had seen some truly nasty -scratch that, he had seen some absolutely horrific things both during his day job and as the Flash yet he had never seen such extensive injuries on a living being. "If the doctor was right about the state of his skeleton-"
"I'd be more surprised if he was lying about it," John muttered.
"Yeah, well if he was right then Blonsky should be dead." Barry continued. "I've been replaying that kick over in my mind and my first summary was horribly understated. The kick alone would have blasted Blonsky's shattered ribcage inwards like shrapnel from a bomb; the fragments should have shredded his lungs and his heart. The first tumble should have shattered his spine and his impact with the tree would have crushed his skull and liquefied his brain."
"Okay, I think I'm justified this one time to ask the bloody obvious question," Raquel asked with a deathly serious frown on her face. "What the hell was in that serum?"
1:02:27 - 1:02:50
"Well, that certainly settles it," Wally murmured to Artemis. "The transformation is one hell of a drain on him."
"That doesn't really make sense, though," She frowned as they watched Betty walk across a motel complex to a huddled-over Bruce. "If the transformation is a drain on him then shouldn't he be too tired to do anything as Big Green?"
"Do you now see why we all took a hard pass on explaining how the Hulk was?"
1:02:51 - 1:03:23
"Kaldur'ahm's question of where one mind stops and the other begins would appear to be of far greater importance than I had attributed to it, it would seem," J'onn remarked in a somber tone. "If these… mental spillovers that Doctor Banner just experienced is a recurring thing then it is possible that their minds may very well dissolve into a mess of mixed up experiences."
"Wait, what?"
"I think what Uncle J'onn means is that… well, if these flashes keep happening then it could be possible that they essentially switch places," M'gann's explanation was directed at everyone, not just Raquel. "It sounds pretty far out but… well, Doctor Banner could begin to see himself as the Hulk, leading him to react purely on instinct like the Hulk does right now."
"I'm sorry, what?!" Wally goggled. "You're saying the Hulk, crazy angry, smashes everything in sight Hulk, could become… what, a Professor Hulk?"
"Well, the more accurate term would be Doctor Hulk otherwise…" The younger Martian shrugged helplessly. "It's just a wild guess, really."
"Well, that would be something to see," Artemis mused. "A Smart Hulk… You know, if they do it right, that could actually be more terrifying than Big Green as he is now. Poor Ross would be even worse off than he is now."
"I agree with Artemis," Kaldur nodded. "Well, about the first part; as to the second… I have been thinking about the General's actions -well, his plan and its execution, really- and the more I look at it, the more I feel like General Ross dug his own grave."
"Dude he dropped a small army on the Hulk and we saw what the Hulk did to them," Dick frowned. "Seems like he did a good job with what he had."
"Dick, he fought like a… what do you call it? Medieval? Yes: when his plan failed, the General's contingency was to fight like a medieval king, ordering all his troops to march across the meadow and go plunging down at the dragon. A noble tactic but a foolish one all the same."
"First off: awesome analogy." Conner nodded respectfully to the team leader. "Second: I'm not sure I understood that awesome analogy."
"It is quite simple, Conner: despite the sizeable force he mobilized and the presence of Captain Blonsky, at the end of the day, the General chose to send his troops forward in waves, subjecting himself to a tactic that relied on defeating the Hulk through numbers." The Atlantean sat forward as he explained: "The problem with that tactic is that he knew that wouldn't work."
"Hold on," Zatanna frowned. "How'd you figure that one?"
"Stark's Sonic Cannons." Raquel muttered as she began to put the pieces together. "He'd never have bothered with Stark's tech if he knew he could win by throwing more and more troops at the Hulk."
"Exactly," Kaldur nodded. "His decision to bring in Stark's weapons even before he thought of injecting the serum into Blonsky shows that he never planned on winning by numbers. And even with Blonsky there, the plan was always to lure the Hulk into position for the cannons."
"Which we know were actually pretty effective considering how they straight up stopped the Hulk in his tracks." Artemis added.
"Right. So why did he stop at only two cannons?" Kaldur continued. "One could suggest that the General only stopped at two cannons because he was uncertain of their effect-"
"But if he was so uncertain, why bother at all?" Dick asked. "Against a target like the Hulk, you can't afford to half-ass things: you either do or do not, there is no room for a trial run."
"I am most impressed by how quickly you all are picking up on all these," J'onn stated, clearly impressed by their deductions. "As you have said, the General marched into this fight underprepared and with no true contingency plan to speak of. And while I accept that the preparations for the Campus confrontation were likely hurried, it would have been far better for him to have tracked Doctor Banner's movements as subtly as possible to allow him to gather enough resources to pin the Hulk down."*
"…Suddenly I'm happy the old man didn't do his job right," Zatanna commented quietly.
1:03:31 - 1:03:49
"Is he okay?" M'gann asked, her tone just as concerned as Elizabeth's. "Maybe it has something to do with the PTSD flashes?"
"It's possible," A slightly green Artemis nodded, "but something tells me the answer's a lot… messier."
1:03:50 - 1:03:58
"Wait." Kara frowned, perplexed. "So what was with all the retching?"
"Maybe he did a deep dive with the brush?" Conner suggested. "I mean, it does happen."
"Just… just keep watching," The younger archer stated.
1:04:00 - 1:04:07
"I think that deserves a word… stronger than improvisation," A faintly green Zatanna muttered.
"I guess you could say that he really… bit off more than he could chew there!" Barry snickered, earning a round of groans from everyone present.
"No offense, man, but please leave the jokes to me yeah?" Wally pleaded.
1:04:08 - 1:04:15
"I like how she just skipped the whole 'he just swallowed a flash drive!' thing," Kara remarked to Barry. "I mean, it was a bit disgusting but considering the circumstances, harping over that would have been silly."
1:04:16 - 1:04:20
"Okay, is it just me or does he seem a bit too happy about the wristwatch doohickey?" Conner asked. "'Cause it's not like the watch can stop him from going green or anything."
"That may be true, Conner, but the watch serves a more important function than you would expect," Diana stated quietly. "The watch is his warning system."
"His… warning system?"
The Amazon nodded somberly. "As we saw during the hunt in Brazil and in the lead-up to the Campus confrontation, Doctor Banner seeks to cure himself because he fears the damage he can do as the Hulk. The anger management classes, the jiujitsu training, the breath techniques… they have all been geared toward helping him prevent the transformation. However, none of them would be effective if he couldn't keep track of the trigger for the transformation."
"So he keeps the monitor on hand -literally- so he can always be aware of how fast his heart's beating." Oliver continued. "For as long as he can keep his heart rate below the 200bpm threshold then he's at least sort of okay."
"There's also the fact that Betty's with him, now." Kara added and Diana nodded in agreement. "With the most important person to him now constantly by his side he needs to be extra careful. My guess is that he remembers how Betty ended up in the hospital after his first transformation so he would want to avoid that at all costs."
"Oh…"
1:04:21 - 1:04:35
"Oh God please don't let him completely ruin whatever he's going to wear next," John muttered.
"What is it?" Diana asked as the scene moved on to show the General alone in his office, wreathed in a cloud of nicotine and staring off into the distance.
Perhaps it would be better if I passed it along, J'onn said, speaking directly to her mind. I believe John's thoughts ran along the lines of Bruce being forced to go… commando.
It took a few moments for her to connect the dots -unlike Barry, Bruce and Oliver, she neither had a protege nor did she grow up in a world where such slangs were commonly used- but the moment she did…
Now you see why I spoke directly to your mind, J'onn thought, thankful that the movie so thoroughly riveted the Team's focus that the didn't see the Amazon's features blanch.
["That's from Quantico," His assistant stated as she walked in, dumping a number of files on his table."They're getting Blanked. The academic language in the published stuff could be three dozen off our list. And we haven't even got samples for three dozen more."
For a few moments, the General said nothing, simply puffing away at his cigar.
Then: "You keep seeing it in your mind, don't you?"
The woman said nothing for a few moments before admitting, "Yes."
"Did it shake you up?"He turned to her with a sardonic chuckle, "And then when it did, made you kneel?"
"We've gone up against some pretty messed up shit and I damn near pissed my pants when we got that close-up shot of the Hulk's enraged face," Raquel admitted. "For someone like her who's never experienced that…"
"Turning to prayer seems pretty par for the course," Oliver finished.
"It was..."She broke off as she tried to get her thoughts in order before continuing: "It was outside my training. An enemy has an agenda, and we fight to block it." She explained, revealing her mindset on her job. "But that... it had no agenda."
"I hate to break it to ya, cop lady, but that's not very true." Artemis sneered. "The Hulk's agenda was to escape the stupid traps you morons set up to catch a guy who didn't want to hurt anyone."
"Sarcasm aside, though, Artemis is quite correct," Kaldur commented. "Judging by the newspaper clippings we saw at the beginning of the movie and what we have seen of the General's nature, I don't think it is a stretch to say that the removal of the General -and like-minded individuals- would be the first step towards ensuring that the Hulk wouldn't be a threat to anyone."
"Ah, but how would the world exist without the power hungry, paranoid screw-ups who chase the shadows in the corners of the room?" Oliver asked as M'gann played the movie.
Another puff on the cigar. "Major, a great writer once said, 'There arecleftsin the rock where we see the back-part of God and tremble.' There's no training for what you saw out there, because it's not a… it's not an enemy that confronts us, it's a new power. Let loose through a crack in the cliff of 'Nature's Mystery.'" He paused to let his words sink in and the camera view shifted to show her standing at attention, her focus son his every word.
"How many times do you think that's happened in all of human history?" He continued."Fire, the splitting of the atom;the universe unveils a secret, and people recoil; cowering in fear and awe."
He sat back for a moment, craning his neck so he could stare at the ceiling for a while before sitting up again. This time, though, he was leaning forward, an earnest fire in his eyes: "And then comes the person who stops trembling. Who steps forward. To face the flame,to seize the burning stick and say: we will ridethis, masterthis and use this.
"And civilization's history is written by those men."
"His type are always the worst," Barry spat disgustedly. "Covering their overreaching ambition with a veneer of scientific advancement!"
"Major, we've glimpsed the back-part of God." He summarized, eyes locked firmly onto hers. "And for our nation, and for our way of life I intend to put a harness around it. And history will say that here, at this moment, we confronted ourfear!"
"Dear Santa, I now have a Christmas request," For all that his words seemed lighthearted and jovial, everyone present could feel the seething fury beneath Oliver's relaxed demeanour and his next words proved just that: "Keep this crazy motherfucker the hell away from Amanda Waller."
"He's a Thanatos bedamned Pandoran." Diana glared.
"I'm sorry, he's a what now?" Zatanna asked, her anger at the General's twisted reasoning taking a backseat to her curiosity.
Surprisingly, it was Kaldur, rather than Diana, that explained: "In both our cultures, there are those who choose to see the release of Hope to our world as a great event to be celebrated despite the untold calamities Pandora unleashed upon the world." The Atlantean sighed. "Needless to say, the division between these 'Pandorans' and those who believe otherwise is quite stark."*
"Yeah, well I may not believe in Pandora and her cute little box but I do stand on the other side of that fence!" Wally scowled. "Especially regarding this! I mean, for crying out loud! We've always found a way to weaponize every major scientific and technological breakthrough! Fire? Nero literally watched Rome burn! The discovery of gunpowder has distilled itself down to the modern arms race and the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki learned firsthand how useful the power to split atoms could be in the right hands!"
"It's like he actively chose to skip the dark side of history!" Dick added. "I mean, the 'Super Soldier' serum is a decent idea but do we really need that kind of thing getting into the wrong hands? Because if I learned anything from Iron Man it's that you can't keep stuff like this out of the wrong hands."
"Yeah, well, like it or not I don't think there's anything we can do about this." John grimaced. He was probably even more outraged at the General's motives but he had to face the fact that they couldn't do anything about it. "We just have to keep watching and hope to God that this man doesn't kick-start World War Three."
The General maintained his determined stare at his assistant for a few moments longer before sitting back and dialing down the intensity. "You're a good soldier Sparr.If you want to go back the rabbit hole, you go with nothing but my thanks."
For a moment, the woman seriously contemplated taking him up on his offer: he had, of his own volition, given her an out with no guilt trips and, as she had come to learn, Ross was nothing if not a man of his word. Still… 'He won't need to guilt trip me; I'd do a wonderful job of it myself,' she thought as she made up her mind.
"I'd just be staring at the window, wondering who was screwing it up in my place."
"I gotta give it to her: lady's got some serious steel in her." Oliver stated respectfully. "Not too many people would willingly jump down this kind of rabbit hole after getting a first taste of things and then being given an out."
"Still, I'm not sure whether to commend her for her courage or cuss her out for her stupidity," Kara frowned. "I mean, she has to know that they can't win; she could die out on the field the next time they go after Bruce!"
"Kara's right," Barry frowned. "They had one shot with the sonic cannons and they blew it: no matter how much of a raging instinctive berserker the Hulk is, something tells me that there is an intellect in there that will never allow the same trick to work on him twice."
"None of that matters to her," John replied, a faint hint of pride noticeable in his tone. "Death's an occupational hazard for a soldier: we all know, we all accept it on some level, that we could die out there and most everyone come to grips with it. The important thing is doing our best to defend our homes; if we succeed at that then everything balances out."
"Upon completion of our warrior training, my mother always quotes a line from one of the greatest Amazon warriors to have lived: True warriors march bravely into the darkness to keep it at bay so our new sisters might tread a path of light." Diana reminisced. "The General's motives may be twisted but hers is almost noble."
"She just wants to beat back the monster in the woods so the kids can sleep better." Zatanna summarized quietly.
A moment later, M'gann played the movie.
The General's office line rang out and Sparr quickly picked it up. A moment later, she turned to her boss, moving over to the TV resting on a cabinet on the wall adjacent to him: "You need to see this."]
1:04:36 - 1:05:04
"So that's where they are," Dick nodded to himself as he quickly entered that little detail into the list of notes he had been taking down since the movie began.
1:05:05 - 1:05:07
"Something tells me Blonsky's going to be a much bigger pain in the ass than just that fly Hulk keeps swatting," Wally noted with a faint scowl. "The only problem is that I can't figure out just how that'll happen with him being bedridden as he is."
1:05:08 - 1:05:37
"Oh he really shouldn't quit his day job," Zatanna groaned, burying her face into the crook of Dick's neck.
1:05:39 - 1:06:21
"Alrighty kids, I don't care how much you know about the worldly world of adults, it's time to snap those eyes shut!" Oliver ordered as a very liberal shot of Bruce groping Betty's upper thigh rolled past. "I literally couldn't care any less if you guys had laser vision in your glares; Dinah's going to do so much worse if she even suspects that I let you guys watch this."
"Dude, you babying us is seriously insulting," Raquel frowned. "At this point, even music videos show way more than what's going on over there," She jerked a thumb at the screen. "Anyway, it's not like they're really going to do anything, not with-"
1:06:22 - 1:06:36
"And that's why your fears are unfounded," Raquel stated pointedly. "We already covered Bruce's inability to get laid without going Green ages ago."
"Still… I can't imagine what he's gotta be feeling here." Dick frowned. "I know that sex isn't an absolute necessity for a relationship but it's almost therapeutic for stress and anger. Having that blocked off from him like this…"
1:06:37 - 1:06:58
"There are like… a million quips I could throw at this about how the lack of 'excitement' is a cause for even more anger but…" Kara grimaced and shook her head sadly. "I'm not sure I'd wish that kind of fate on anyone."
"Yeah, well I'm wondering who's getting the shorter end of the stick here," John said. "Sure, Banner's pretty much cursed to live a sexless life but Betty's not getting a walk in the park either."
"Uh… not to make her sound like a slut or anything but she could just go for some NSA," Artemis shrugged. "I mean, it is on the table."
"That is your brain talking, Artemis, with a bit of…" Diana broke off with a sigh. It wasn't that she was a prude who was repulsed by the idea of sex; rather, it was the notion of talking about ex to a minor in a public setting that had her hesitating. "I do not mean that you are wrong, rather, you are thinking of this from a logical stance. The problem is that this cannot be approached with logic: the saying 'the heart wants what the heart wants' is painfully accurate here.
"Doctor Ross loves Banner so much that she willingly abandoned her current boyfriend to search for him. She flagrantly disobeyed her father and put her life on the line to stand before the Hulk simply because she saw enough of Bruce in him. With that in mind, do you really think she would simply agree to have meaningless sex with strangers when she now knows what he is going through?"
Artemis couldn't answer that: logic -spurred on by a healthy dose of hormones- dictated that the choice was simple. Emotions, however, were far more fickle.
1:07:05 - 1:07:13
"No. Fucking. Way!" Dick exclaimed in absolute shock at the sight onscreen.
1:07:15
"Sweet mother of Christ!" Oliver breathed, as dumbfounded as every one present.
They were all familiar with superhuman healing in one way or another: from the Kryptonians' solar-boosted physiology to Diana's divine physiology to Barry and Wally's Speedforce enhanced healing, they had all seen quicker than normal recovery rates.
But for a person to have recovered from the sheer level of damage Blonsky had suffered in less than a DAY was nothing short of-
"Godlike," Zatanna muttered in awe as the General slowly inspected his Ace, searching for even the slightest hint that this was the same man that had been utterly . "That rate of healing is nothing short of godlike."
"I'm not going to deny that I am really tempted to get my hands on a vial of that but…" Dick shook his head as if physically throwing the temptation of the serum off. "There has to be a price for this. A boost to his base physical stats is one thing but coming back from the literal jaws of death? And in less than a day?! No, the price for this has to be exorbitant."
1:07:16 - 1:07:55
"This… This isn't going to end well," Kara muttered quietly.
"That's a given at this point," Kaldur stated. "The real question is… who will the victim be?"
TW:TIH
*- Marvel, here's a World War Hulk What If…? for ya: What if… Betty had betrayed the Hulk? Somebody contact the Marvel creative team: I think we have an answer to all the fans' greatest plea!
*- Before you jump down my throat about how 'it would only get Hulk angrier' and 'the angrier Hulk gets…' J'onn's statement is from the perspective of a person who DOESN'T know all that. If this was a third-party setup where an omnipotent type character dragged them over for a watching party, then I would correct that notion; right now, these guys are the equivalent of intelligent non-comic fans watching the TIH movie for the first time. Some of their thoughts are pretty spot on (like the Professor Hulk thing) while others are close but just slightly off (like this) and then some others will be WILDLY off target.
*- If people can believe some of the truly ludicrous things they do, then this little bit of extreme optimism or 'silver-lining-ism' or whatever you want to call it shouldn't be too far fetched. Also: Kaldur can explain 'Pandoranism' because the Atlanteans and the Amazons share similar beliefs in the Greek Pantheon so they would likely share a few myths and legends.
[]- You will note that the text written between these two symbols is without timestamps. This is the Nature's Mystery deleted scene, a scene that Vein put into the transcript and one that I felt would be pretty cool to roll with so it's added in here too.
I'd like to say that I have more to add but that'd be a lie.
Thanks as usual to Katana and Vein for their support and to Mr War, my partner/editor. You guys are the best!
Also: VeinBloodborne (he who provided the transcript for this) has crossposted his RWBY Watches The Incredible Hulkfic on Watt Pad (y'all know how it's spelt; I just don't wanna give the eye in the sky any more reasons to shoot me down). Please be sure to look him up and show him some love!
Finally: I'll be taking the rest of the month off to prepare for NaNoWriMo which will kick off in November. As such, my next updates will be in December.
Please support my work! pat-re-on.-com-/-theethereallord Remember to remove the dashes. Your support is greatly appreciated.
Finally: To Teen Shallot
Of course Yarhee guy and I are lazy! It's not like the site has a policy that straight up bans copyrighted content like movie transcripts from being used. I mean, jeez, I'm so fucking lazy I just type up a full, transcript inclusive version of this that is crossposted on Sufficient Velocity alongside this one just for shits and giggles! Christ, I'm so lazy I churned this fic right back out less than a week after it was taken down for policy violation despite dealing with two jobs and other real-life matters. I really should stop typing, though; I'm pretty sure people like you who have never posted a word on this site save for baseless claims are the true heroes of hard work. Have a nice day!
Sorry guys but that comment SERIOUSLY ticked me off.