Talia felt the detective's eyes on her as she walked out into the chilly night outside her lab. She had been slow to make her way over to him, and even slower to make eye contact. This was not out of nervousness, but in order to test the man's patience.
She made her eyes wander from the ground to distant trees, her vision going in and out of focus as she habitually fidgeted with her glasses, sliding the frames up and down the bridge of her nose. Her peripheral vision revealed the detective fidgeting anxiously, a subtle impatience in his stride. I can use this. Finally, she flicked her gaze upwards and met Martin Colvin face to face.
"Thank you for meeting with me, Dr. Walker," said Colvin. The detective was making rigid eye contact, almost to a fault, a move that Talia figured was an attempt to cover the fact his gaze had been wandering her body, sizing her up. His eyes were a deep brown,matching the darker strands of his salt and pepper hair, and days old demeanor was curt yet attempting to be polite - an attitude that made Talia feel a bit calmer. He's here for help.
"I hope I'm not interrupting any important work," he added gruffly, clearly still agitated after Talia had insisted they meet outside instead of inside of her lab.
Talia, however, wasn't had already just dealt with an angry adult minutes earlier, after she had rebuffed Rachel's attempt to accompany her outside to talk with the detective. You're wonderful, Rach, but hostility toward the police would not help me right now any more than this guy seeing my wrecked equipment inside.
"Oh no," she said. "I had just finished up, actually."
Colvin nodded. "Oh, good."
A brief pause lengthened into an almost uncomfortable silence, before Colvin reached into his deep brown jacket adorned with the crest of the state's police, withdrawing a manila folder containing a handful of papers which he proceeded to thumb through.
"Well, let me get down to business. What do you know about the She-Hulk?"
Talia felt a shiver at the name, but if there was one thing she was good at, it was suppressing emotion. Most of the time, at least.
"Honestly, not as much as I'd like to, detective."
Colvin continued to look for eye contact unsuccessfully, releasing a smirk when he caught a brief glimpse of Talia's gaze. "Well looks like that puts us on the same page, doctor."
Colvin reached into his folder and withdrew a paper adorned with what Talia believed resembled a waveform. "I'm hoping you can help me understand more about this." He handed the paper over into her grasp.
It was indeed a waveform, she had been correct, and it was a waveform she was very familiar with.
"Gamma radiation," she said, peering through her eyeglasses.
"Yes." Colvin walked over to her side, and motioned to the graphic. "This was recorded at Buscema Lab, in the wake of the She-Hulk's attack." He glanced up to Talia, who again avoided eye contact, before moving his gaze back to the paper.
"Now," he continued, "I don't know two shits about the difference between a gamma wave and an ocean wave, other than a gamma wave is supposed to be dangerous. Add one dangerous piece of radiation to a dangerous thing running around, and you'll understand when I say I'm a bit worried, yes?"
Talia continued to peer at the graph, almost staring through it. They know a lot more than I would've thought. I need to see how much more they have figured out. "Oh yes, detective, I understand."
Colvin smirked again. "Good." He stepped away, replacing the manila folder back into his jacket. "You can keep that, don't know how much good it'll do you, but with any luck it'll make this whole thing a bit easier."
Talia folded the paper up and tucked it away inside her own coat, the white lab coat from her lab, that she wore over the sweatshirt and jeans she had hastily thrown on before running outside to meet the detective. "Waveforms aside - what exactly can I help you with, detective?"
Colvin smirked and laughed to himself. "I thought you'd never ask." Talia followed the arc of his right arm as the detective motioned to the trees. "Well, I've got a living urban legend walking around out there leaving behind gamma radiation-" he paused, then reversing his arm motion to point towards the lab building where Talia worked. "- and,from what your counterparts at all the other labs around here tell me, you've got equipment to detect this radiation, being a gamma specialist and all, inside there.
"To cut straight to the point: can you help me find the She-Hulk before she does anymore damage?"
OK, here we go.
The doctor faked a light chuckle that she forced from between her lips, raising her eyebrows and smirking as she once more straightened her glasses with the tip of her index finger. "Do you really need my help to find a giant, half-naked green woman stomping around town? She should be fairly easy to pick out of a crowd."
"If it were only that simple," said Colvin in an exasperated tone, before pausing momentarily to downplay his frustration. Talia could see by his mannerisms that he was hiding something that he had wanted to reveal.
"How is it not simple?" Talia said, challenging him. "Surely the police have a way to track a monster causing this much havoc. Again, big and green and destructive."
Colvin's eyebrows furrowed. "Let's just say it has a way of hiding in plain sight."
Does he know about the transformation? I did lose clothes there during the change.
"Like a shapeshifter? Surely there are more qualified people that -"
"Listen," interrupted Colvin, frowning. He closed his eyes and briefly rubbed his eyes, before running his hand back through his hair. "I know this sounds like a waste of time, but it isn't to me. You come highly recommended by Buscema Lab, and I'll take their word at it, meaning you're a smart one. I'd be thrilled if you said yes so we can continue our investigation.
"That said, if you have no intention of helping, please, however, don't waste my time. Wasting time makes me angry, and Dr. Walker, you wouldn't like me when I'm angry."
The faux smirk evaporated from Talia's face and she was quick to match Colvin's frown. "We're more similar on that than you'd think, detective."
Colvin paused, looking regretful for a second, before his face turned to weariness. "Sorry to be blunt, but I didn't get much sleep last night. I would greatly appreciate your help. However, I can also go door to door to find another scientist if I have to."
He reached into his back pocket and withdrew his wallet, sliding out a small, rectangular white card that he offered to Talia between his index and middle finger. "Take 'til the morning, just tell me yes or no by then, OK? Think on it."
As the doctor took the card, Colvin turned towards his unmarked police sedan, but then paused to look over his shoulder, a sliver of his brown eyes once again coming into view. "And let me know if you see any green monsters in your neighborhood."
As the detective departed in his vehicle, Talia pulled the open flaps of her lab coat together and crossed her arms over her chest, swaying in the wind. She grabbed in a deep breath of air with her mouth, letting it softly exhale through her nose.
Shit.
For almost half a year, Talia's laboratory had acted more as a home to her than her actual house - a side effect of her spending many of her waking hours attempting to cure herself of the creature that lurked within. Being within her actual house brought with it a nagging sensation that precious work was not being performed that could be leading her a step closer to removing her curse.
Tonight, however, home was her only option. A break from the lab was necessary after the chaotic experiment from earlier, and she had already imposed enough stress on Rachel for one day to even consider crashing there, as she often did to find some solace. As before, she had needed to convince Rachel that she would be OK on her own in order to get her to go her separate way and no doubt get the rest she deserved.
The doctor ran her thumb against the textured print of Detective Colvin's business card as she held it in her hand. His plea for her to help had been repeating in her mind the whole day, and, to her almost surprise, she was considering accepting it.
Saying "no" would be the easy way. It'd be stupid to get involved in the hunt for your own monster!
Talia huffed and threw the card down upon a small desk that rested in the corner of her kitchen. However he knows more about the creature than I like. If he knows that there's a human element to it, then how long before . . .
Cutting off her thought, Talia shook her head and flipped the kitchen light off, moving toward her bedroom. Be a scientist: No assumptions, only fact.
The doctor removed her jacket and tossed it on the ground, before waddling in her jeans and sweatshirt over to her bed and collapsing face first into the layers of covers above her mattress. She kicked her shoes off onto the floor as well before rolling onto her back and staring up at the ceiling.
No matter how physically tired she ever was when she laid down to rest, sleep refused to come easily to her. Her brain, which was going a mile a minute every waking moment of her days, resisted every urge to shut down, instead plaguing her with untested ideas, plans for tomorrow, analyses of things she had done and if she could have done them better. Like clockwork, her conversation with Detective Colvin was playing through her mind. Had her routine given her an advantage, or did she draw suspicion onto herself? What am I going to do about helping him or not?
Soon, her heavy eyelids finally were able to overpower even her busy mind, which began to slow from sheer lack of energy. As she began to fade, she realized that she hadn't truly slept in almost 48 hours, her last night having been spent as the creature after the incident in Buscema Lab. As Talia's breathing became deeper, her mind slipped into unconsciousness, and soon into sleep.
Talia stood in her lab, looking over the data from earlier in the day. She hadn't been thinking clearly earlier, being upset about what she had done to Rachel, and a second look on a rested mind could only help, not hurt.
As the doctor typed on the keyboard, she positioned her eyes to absorb the rows upon rows of data that flashed before her. Somewhere in there, she knew, would be a clue bringing her closer to understanding the nature of her beast, therefore making it easier to destroy it.
"You can't get rid of me, Tal," came a voice from behind her. Despite using Rachel's nickname for her, the voice was not that of her friend - it was deep and cold, the tone of the words instantly making her skin prickle. Talia, however, kept focused on the data, still continuing to scroll in front of her.
The deep voice echoed with a laugh. "Think science is going to save you? Science gave you me."
Talia spun around, and there was the creature, only the beast looked exactly like her.
The Talia-creature smirked, pulling its lab coat closed and crossing its arms across its chest. "Finally, I have your attention."
Talia faced her mirror image's cackling with a stone face. "You have nothing of me willingly."
"Oh," said the Talia-creature, "but I have all of you." She gestured to Talia's feet with her left hand, raising her index finger up slowly toward her head, before turning to point at her own body. "I am all of you. All thanks to what you did to yourself."
"No," growled the doctor. "I am me; you're an impostor. A thief."
The Talia-creature laughed. "Now, now, don't get angry at me - I'm not angry at you." It lifted its right arm and motioned outward, and from nothingness appeared Rachel, still and emotionless, staring blankly into nothing like she was a porcelain doll. "After all, not only have you let me out to play twice in one day, but you also put your friend's life in danger."
The doctor lost a breath. "I...I didn't do it intentionally."
The Rachel-doll, eyes wide and blank, whispered, "intentionally."
The Talia-creature moved her arms to the other side of it, and there appeared the doll-like doppelganger of Martin Colvin, the detective she had met earlier. "You've also been careless. Cops are getting suspicious of you, Tal."
"Don't call me Tal!" Talia yelled.
"Tal," whispered the Rachel-doll, which was then echoed by the Colvin-doll.
Talia put her hands on her head. "Stop it, stop it! You're ruining everything!" She ran forward and drew back her hand, before arcing it in front of her directly into the cheekbone of the Talia-creature. Her mirror image's head snapped back, but its smile grew wider. "Puny."
The Talia creature's body began to stir, and instantly it started to grow in size, clothing tearing off its body and green hue flowing across its skin. Talia could only look up as her creature took its true form. She tried to move, tried to yell, tried to run away, but she found herself paralyzed. The creature's hand wrapped itself around Talia's neck, and powerful jade muscles flexed as she felt herself lifted off the ground, feet dangling helplessly.
"Oh god no!" Talia shouted as she sprung up from her bed, sweat rolling down her forehead. Her eyes were a deep, blazing green as her labored breaths wheezed in and out. Her right hand had found an anchor on the wooden bedpost at the corner of her bed, and with a surge of energy her fingers sunk into the wood, splintering the cylinder and sending pieces flying across the room.
Talia arched her back and curled her legs, rising herself from the bed as her body began to change. The thick fabric of her sweatshirt drew tight as her torso began to enlarge, before it finally gave out, bursting open at the center between her expanding breasts and splitting down her midriff. Engorged biceps exploded out of her sleeves, while thick and flexing thigh muscles tore the thick denim of her tight jeans down its seams, freeing newly empowered legs that kicked at the bed.
As the metamorphosis surged forth, the changing Talia lunged forward onto her knees and grasped at her head with her hands, her shoulders expanding and cracking as her back muscles popped her bra clasp open and completed the disintegration of her sweatshirt. A wave of green began to wash over her body as her layered brown hair lengthened and thickened into a jade mane that fell over her enraged green pupils.
The bed frame began to creak before violently crashing to the ground, breaking under the pressure of the new form atop it. Once more born into the world, the She-Hulk unleashed a deep and powerful growl that shattered the bedroom windows and echoed her pain into the night.