Author's Note: I still don't own Marvel or any of their characters.

xxxx

When he woke, Sif was holding his hand. The room was pitch black like someone had cut the power. The hand holding lasted about a second because Bruce was being scooped up into someone's powerful arms. Piotr. Although Bruce was still dopey from the tranquilizers, he figured out that Sif must had led a group of the students to his rescue.

His eyes would only stay open for a few seconds at a time and his need to sleep was winning as he felt strong arms hold him against what must of been Piotr's organic steel chest. No gunfire. No one was pursuing them. Bruce wondered how a Russian boy ended up in an American school, but now wasn't the time to ask.

Although it was winter, ice inside a building meant Bobby. With his eyesight blurry from the drugs, Bruce couldn't see much more than the contrast of the dark cell and the sunlight spilling through the open door. Light sparkled on the melting ice. After they exiting the building, Bruce could feel snow flakes fall on his hair, skin and indoor clothes, making his body shiver as Piotr continued to hold him against his bare metal chest. He didn't remember going through a doorway; then he was slipping in and out of consciousness the whole time.

Piotr placed Bruce onto a vinyl seat. Bruce's eyes closed and sleep won out, again. Sif's arms were around him. Lacking the energy to even sit up, Bruce leaned against Sif. The doors slammed shut and the van was moving.

Sif said, "You'd be surprised how easy doors unlock from the inside." She must have said things like I love you while Bruce was falling in and out of consciousness. Now she was making small talk.

In his drug-induced haze, Bruce tried to see his rescuers' faces, but focusing took too much of an effort and he closed his eyes. He was sharing the middle seat of the van with Sif. His seat-belt was on and, although the heat was on, he was still shivering from the cold.

Kitty said, "Douglass hacked the computers to silence the alarms. Did you know that Jubilee's energy blasts disrupt electrical power? It was a team effort."

"We aren't going back to that doctor," said Sif. "Bruce, I want you to deliver our baby."

Bruce smiled weakly. "I took you to Misgard to get you the best medical care." Now wasn't the time of argue, so he changed the subject. "Does Xavier know you took his van?"

Logan, who was driving, said, "We borrowed it, again."

"When I'm more awake, I want to hear the whole story." Bruce could feel his eyes shutting and collapsed against his wife. Piotr must have carried him to his bed because he woke up in his bedroom, surrounded by his wife, Logan and the students who rescued him - Jubilee, Kitty, Piotr, Douglass and Bobby.

He had an IV in his arm. Good, they were diluting the drugs still in his bloodstream. He wouldn't be able to change into the Hulk until whatever was in him was out. General Ross wanted him calm. The feeding tube cut a hole through his shirt and tee shirt into his stomach. They weren't planning on killing him right away or they wouldn't have gone to that trouble. Did they want him as a living incubator for his mutated cells or did they want him alive for other reasons? And would they try to capture him, again?

Douglass said, "We tracked you from your debit card and driver's license. They took your cellphone but they didn't think to take your wallet. The rest was easy. Kitty got in the building as I turned off the alarms. She opened the doors from the inside and we just walked in. Jubilee shorted the electrical systems. You have a feeding tube, again. I guess they weren't going to risk waking you up to feed you."

Bruce smiled. "They wouldn't want me waking up angry. Where was I?"

"In a facility outside Washington DC," said Douglass.

"I was asleep that long? Douglass, they probably took my wallet. I keep my cards in my shirt pocket and they didn't bother to undress me. They were probably nervous about touching me too much even with the tranquilizer." If an incident should occur, Bruce would rather lose his ID because his shirt ripped off then have any ID on the Hulk because it was easier to replace his ID then deal with the press announcing that Robert Bruce Banner was the Hulk. Remembering the glare of the ice inside the building, Bruce asked, "Bobby, did you help?"

"While Piotr and Mrs. Banner watched for guards, I put a wall of ice at each of the doors not leading to our exit," said Bobby. "Mrs. Banner threw a couple guards against the walls and the equipment. Bullets doesn't faze her and they bounce off of Piotr. In panic, I froze a guard. The others ran after that. I don't like hurting people. I came along in case we needed to put out fires. Freezing people wasn't part of the deal. Logan stayed with the van, so we would have a speedy getaway."

"Honey, you took a bullet for me," said Bruce.

"It was a flesh wound," said Sif. "The bullet popped out while it was healing. I got a bit overly excited and said something about them needing to worry about Mrs. Hulk. I think that scared the guards more than Bobby turning one of them into a Popsicle."

Bruce wondered why Sif saying that they needed to worry about Mrs. Hulk had scared the guards. Something wasn't adding up.

There was a knock on the door. "May I come in?" asked Professor Xavier.

"Sure," said Bruce. "If you can fit."

The students made room for Xavier's wheelchair.

"You said you would protect me," said Bruce, who was too tired to get angry.

"Douglass found you on a tracking device," said Xavier. "I had my best X-Men retrieve you. Everyone did their part. I couldn't be prouder."

"They're children," said Bruce. "All but Piotr. You sent children to rescue me from a military installation."

Piotr was nineteen; thus, technically, an adult.

"With you, Sif and Logan gone, someone had to watch the school," said Xavier.

"You had a 17-year-old boy freeze a man," said Bruce. "I wouldn't call that responsible. Bobby, you can borrow my therapist."

"Thank you, Dr. Banner," said Bobby.