A/N : A humongous thank you to those who bothered to click on this fanfic, read, follow and comment it! As a struggling writer, it means a lot to me and it inspires me to continue this story, to satisfy you ! Because, honestly, if people weren't reading this, I wouldn't bother writing. So thank you.

Without further ado, here's the first chapter of She's stronger than you know, a heart of steel starts to grow

Bruce's P.O.V

"She's stronger than you know, a heart of steel starts to grow."

by OnceUponAPenname

- Chapter one - "Struggling to make things right"

HELICARRIER LANDING STRIP

Dr Bruce Banner wanted to bolt the second the small plane - called Quinjet by Romanoff and others SHIELD agents – landed. People around him were too busy to notice him. The one who did notice him either stare in fear and glare in anger. Either way, they kept their distance from him and he kept his distance from them. He should've stayed in India. He could have. He was the Hulk after all. A weapon. A massive killing machine. The doctor shook his head, trying to keep the voices away. Voices that sounded a lot like General 'Thunderbolt' Ross. The irony.

Romanoff had left him, walking away with no explanation and he really didn't care. He knew he had scared her, earlier. He hadn't really care either. Yet, he did care. She had been bold, daring even though she knew he was prompt to turn into the Other Guy as he nicknamed him. She had reminded him of Betty. But no matter how brave Natasha Romanoff may have seemed, she didn't trust him. She wasn't Betty Ross. And he liked to think that Elizabeth 'Betty' Ross trusted him. Bruce and the Other was when he his realized that he didn't care about Agent Natasha Romanoff or any persons he might recountered during his stay.

So here he stood, nervously playing with his hands and moving around as he tried to avoid people walking in his way and him walking in their. He heard them before seeing them. Two persons. One unknown male, one familiar female. They were talking about... trading cards?

"Dr. Banner." The unknown male called.

Bruce looked up to see one tall and muscular blonde man walking toward him, Romanoff trailing behind him. The scientist quickly recognized the blue-eyed blonde man as Captain Steven Rogers, the only successful subject who had been injected with the serum in the 1940s. He prefered to see him as a subject than an actual person. It was easier. He only had a few seconds to calm himself as Steve came closer, a hand outstretched.

"Oh, yeah. Hi. They told me you'd be coming." Bruce simply said.

"Word is you can find the cube."

"Is that the only word about me?" He asked, the ghost of a sarcastic smirk on his face.

"Only word I care about." Steve simply replied.

Bruce hummed as Steve looked at him, smirking slightly. He didn't seemed to care. The super-soldier didn't pay him much attention before turning around and looking around the bridge, obviously impressed. A little talk wouldn't hurt, thought the gamma-expert.

"Must be strange for you, all of this."

"Well, this is actually kind of familiar." The blonde man replied, stuffing his hands in his pocket

Military background, right Bruce reminded himself with a nod. The redhead agent chose this moment to approach the two men. Well, she approached Steve. He just happened to be standing next to him.

"Gentlemen, you may wanna step inside in a minute. It's gonna get a little hard to breath."

As those words were spoken, the Helicarrier started to shake and workers started to strap the small plans onto the bridge and ran around an as the motors and engines were turned on. Still impressed and a little bit curious, Steve started walking toward the edge and asked:

"Is this is a submarine?"

I highly doubt it "Really?" Bruce scoffed "They want me in a submerged pressurized metal container."

As they both stood near to the edge, four huges lift vans appeared from the sides and the Helicarrier started to elevate in the air. Steve kept watching in awe as Bruce sarcastically smiled and yelled over the noise:

"OH NO, THIS IS MUCH WORSE!"

INT. HELICARRIER BRIDGE.

IN THE AIR.

Both Steve and Bruce followed Natasha into the aircraft, drinking in awe everything around them. Agents with matching outfits were moving around, computers lined up and people shouting things at each ocher in the chaos and noise, and somehow, understanding each other. The deadly ginger beauty turned to them, an amused smile on her lips as she watched them. Steve looked like a little kid in a toy store, eyes wide ans mouth open while Bruce tried not to touch anything or attract attention to himself, avoiding any forms of autority.

"-All engines operating. S.H.I.E.L.D emergency protocol 193.6 in affect." A tall brunette ordered around her, which made nosense to the doctor but others seemed to understand "We are at lock, sir." she added, turning to a dark-skinned eye-patched man.

"Good. Let's vanish." The man he knew as Nick Fury simply said.

As the brunette, not facing him, kept shouting orders as Nick Fury stepped down of his pad, with a simple:

"Gentlemen."

Bruce frowned when Steve slipped a 10-dollar bill into the SHIELD director's hand, the former not looking at him, still in awe. The dark-brownish haired woman, standing next to him, eyed strangely, almost imitating the doctor's facial expression. And that was when Bruce finally realized that he knew the young woman. He knew this dark-haired and brown haired woman he already knew years ago. Except that her then-playful brown eyes were now, cold and her dark hair were up in a perfect bun.

"Doctor." Fury called, bringing the attention to him "Thanks for coming."

Her brown eyes met his for a few seconds before she bowed her head, breaking the small exchange. Bruce cleared his throat before turning to the dark-skinned man and said:

"Thanks for asking so nicely. So, uh.. How long am I staying?"

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the clear."

Even though he didn't believe he'd ever be in the clear with any authority, he nodded and wondered:

"Where are you with that?"

He turned to a man wearing a suit – who seemed to have appeared from nowhere – and waited for him to continue. Natasha, not seeming to be interested, bent down to examine something on the screens nearby. The suit-wearing man – Agent Phil Coulson, he learned earlier – cleared his throat and said:

"We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops. If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

"That's still not gonna find them in time." Natasha protested, paying attention after all, as she looked up."

"You have to narrow the field. How many spectometers do you have access to?" And as he asked that, Bruce could swore he saw the hint of a smile on the brunette's lips.

"How many are there?" Fury inquired.

"Call every lab you know, tell them to put the spectometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm based on cluster recognition. At least, we could rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

Bruce was aware that most of them hadn't understand a word he had just said, but they didn't dare to cross him. He restrained a snicker as they exchanged a few glances. Fury finally said:

"Agent Romanoff, would you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please."

The redhead straightened and nodded as she passed him by, asking him mutely to follow him. He did. But before that, Bruce turned toward the tall dark-haired woman and said:

"It's good to see you, Maria."

Both agents, supersoldier and directors looked at the brunette as she sighed and looked at him with a small smile, replying.

"You too, Bruce."

The doctor returned the smile and followed Natasha as the latter broke the silence, saying:

"You're gonna love it, Doc. We got all the toys."

IN THE HELICARRIER LAB,

IN THE AIR.

Bruce was playing with a pen between his fingers, twirling in his chair. He had the lab all by himself. Not that they trusted him to be alone, no. The lab was guarded by two armed agents. The gamma expert scoffed as he thought about it. As if it was going to change something if he turned into a 8 feet green raging monster.

He heard a 'slush' sound and looked up as the doors automatically opened. Bruce straightened when he saw Maria enter the room, a trail of food in her hands. Scowling, he asked in a sarcastic – sarcasm had become him – tone:

"You volunteer to feed the monster?"

The brunette scoffed as she sat beside him, placing the trail on a table. Crossing her legs and arms, she leaned against the back of her chair.

"Don't be a martyr, Bruce. Nobody likes them."

"I thought nobody likes smartasses." He muttered.

"That too." she said, playing with the hem of her shirt.

Bruce watched her carefully, tilting his head to the side. Gone was the rebellious teenager who helped him sneak into her house, hiding him away from her father and him helping her with scientific homeworks while waiting for her sister. Caughting his glance, she smiled and asked, frowning:

"What is it?"

"Nothing. Just... wondering how's life."

"Right" the brunette scoffed "You just want to hear about Betty."

He tried to wince at the name, but he could see that Maria had noticed. So, he grabbed a triangle sandwich and bit into it, not wondering if something had been slipped into for the first time since he returned. He swallowed the food, before saying again:

"No, seriously. I was wondering how little Mariana Ross had evolved into... this."

"Well, ain't you flattering! And it's Maria Hill, now. Mariana Ross seemed so wrong." Maria was the one to wince this time.

"I bet."

A silence fell into the lab, interrupted by crunching and slurping every thirty seconds. Still not looking up, the brunette muttered:

"You shouldn't have come, B. You could have say no."

"I thought about it." The doctor said. "But then, again, I didn't really have a choice."

"You do realize that your presence, here, is already getting you in trouble. And I'm not talking about SHIELD people or FBI agents. I-"

"Maria!" Bruce interrupted, making the dark-haired woman looking up at him. "I know. And I don't worry about it for now. I'm just here to do my job, and hopefully, I'll do it quickly so I can get out of here. But" the doctor shot a look at his watch before adding "It's pretty late. I think I deserve a break. Sooo, Maria... How's life?"

A rare smile appeared on her lips as Maria reached to grab the apple resting on the food trail and bit into it. Bruce grinned as he leaned back into his chair, bringing the other half of his sandwich in his mouth. Between bits, both of them exchanged a few words, laughed when needed, not bothered by the occasionals silences. Maybe he didn't regret coming out of hiding that much.

TBC.