((OPEN)) Have you hugged your physicist today?

[hyperkinesia]

Who: Bruce Banner and YOU
Where: Library, kitchen, dining room, gardens, basement lab, etc. ANYWHERE.
When: From the 16th to the 19th, state your date!
Rating: I don't expect anything past PG
Summary: Bruce is seeking the comfort of simple physical contact. Arms brushing, hands holding, hugging, anything. It doesn't even matter if he knows you or if he's never seen you before. He craves for it so much he might not even notice he's doing it at first.
Note: I'm alright with both brackets and prose, pick your poison.
The Story:

[ It starts with nothing but a feeling, something itching at the far back of his mind, something that's entirely different from the kind of clawing and scratching he's normally used to. But he brushes it aside, he doesn't think much of it - not until he starts crossing paths with random people on the hallways and the gardens and finds himself reaching to touch strangers he's never even seen before.

Most times, he manages to draw back and rush away before actually doing anything. Other times he finds himself detouring just so he can brush his fingers against someone else's, or feel his arm bump lightly against theirs. But somehow it's only when he's alone that he starts to fully realize that something's happening. The mind is quick to make the association, though knowing that this might very well be one of these events doesn't really help him in stopping this craving for touch from happening.

So instead he starts seeking solitude. He hides in corners of the library, and he uses the kitchen and the dining room when there's no one else around. The rest of the time, he retreats to the lab and stays there, surrounded by what's as close to familiarity as he can get, and at least there if someone approaches him, it's people he's more comfortable with. Relatively speaking. ]

Comments

[hyperkinesia]

He lets out a soft noise, almost a chuckle, his eyes darting to the side as he follows after her, going about helping her prepare the sandwiches as he grabs some bread from nearby.

"Better safe than sorry." That's how he goes about anything these days. Better not risk it much, better not get too close. He knows what it's like to let his guard down for just a moment, and see the people around him getting hurt - the people he cares for, those he trusts. He'd almost done that to Natasha, if it hadn't been for Thor.

[widows_kiss]

"I've never liked that phrase," she comments as she starts assembling some sandwiches, her eyes on her work rather than on him, because he was talking and she liked encouraging that, especially because it always seemed to give her such fascinating insights into who he was.

"Being safe isn't always that great either. If you don't take risks here and there, it seems a pretty sorry state in itself."

[hyperkinesia]

"Thanks, I'm well aware." That his state is a sorry one, that is. He doesn't resent her words, he understands - and he agrees too. But he doesn't have much of a choice. She should know, that doing his best to be safe is a whole lot better than the alternative.

"It's my life, Natasha. It's how I work. I'd rather be sorry for this, than be sorry for what can happen if I'm not..." He glances at her, smiles, then turns his gaze away. "Careful."

[widows_kiss]

"That wasn't what I meant," She replies, shaking her head and giving him a sideways look as she puts a sandwich together for him.

"You are careful. You're always careful. I understand that, and I appreciate it - trust me, I'm in no hurry to play tag with the Other Guy again ever. But at the same time... None of us are exactly safe, either. Not to mention..." She pauses, trying to choose the right words to voice the concept she's been idly pondering since New York. "I'm not sure it would be the same, a second time around. With the Other Guy, I mean."

[hyperkinesia]

As he listens, and he does so intently, he finishes helping out with the sandwiches, but as soon as his hands are idle, they itch again, beg for that warmth, and slowly he's resting his hand on her shoulder.

"Sorry," he says and nods to the touch, light and barely there, but it's beyond him to stop himself. If she minds, obviously, he'll just have to force himself across the kitchen, or maybe even back to his own room entirely. Then, with a breath, he tries to at least start explaining the whole thing to her. "Look, that might be partly true. I can control some transformations, I can choose if I want to change. But even then I can never fully control the guy himself. And then..."

He trails off for a moment. "And then there will always be times when it's not my choice to turn. Those times it's like I'm not even there."

[widows_kiss]

"But you are still there, in glimpses," she counters, sliding one of the finished sandwiches towards him and turning to lean her hip against the counter. It made the reach to her shoulder a little far so she reaches up for his hand, bringing it down between them to cup in both of hers. Maybe the skin contact will help.

She's still choosing her words carefully, because this is a touchy subject for him and with good reason. And they don't know each other well enough for her to press too far without a little caution. He doesn't trust her, but that's something she's used to working around all the same. She can't help but observe the details that spill out around her - nuances, personalities, reactions. All of it gets cataloged and remembered, factored into the growing picture of the people around her she builds on with every little conversation or chance moment. And it hadn't been only Bruce she'd watched. Not to mention she didn't know how much he remembered when he transformed back, how much filter there was between Bruce and the Hulk. The Other Guy. Whatever he preferred to call his other half.

"The first time you turned on me, Bruce, you'd had Loki's scepter playing with you. You didn't trust me - didn't trust any of us, really, and that's understandable. That made us possible threats, and when you changed, you struck out. It was terrifying, yes, but I can also understand it. New York was different, though. I don't know if because there's a hint of you still conscious when the Other Guy comes out to play or if maybe he... maybe he gets filtered moments of what happens when he's not, like you've said you do. Trust might be stretching things there - we were all new to each other, but we were still functioning as a team. Even you. The Other Guy - you - didn't see us as threats. Three different times you dropped down and drew off squadrons advancing on my position. You took Steve's orders. You saved Tony. I understand that there's always a chance for an accident, that it's not always a matter of choice for you. But I also think the Other Guy is more aware of what goes on around him than you might think."

[hyperkinesia]

He doesn't move as she shifts away, but he does welcome the feeling of skin as she takes his hand between hers, his fingers curling around hers just barely, with as much hesitance as this event allows him to show apparently. At least she doesn't seem to mind the touch too much, and that's more of a relief than the contact itself is.

It's not true that he doesn't trust her. He doesn't trust her as much as he could, that much is true, but he trusts her more than she realizes. Not that it matters much in the end, because he believes the real problem here is for people to actually trust him. It's no small thing, and he knows that better than anyone. He wouldn't trust himself. Honestly on bad days he really doesn't trust himself at all.

He's still trying to learn to work around that. To learn how to live a life while being scared of himself.

He lets her say her piece with no interruption, his eyes meeting hers for only scarce moments here and there. Avoidance is so easy to fall back to, that he finds himself glancing away without even realizing he's doing it. But he hears, even if he doesn't exactly believe all of it. How much of it was Bruce, or how much of it was the Hulk. He can't remember ever having that much control after a transformation before and he knows it, which is why he's more inclined to think of it as a fluke. A lucky break.

Maybe the only reason why he didn't turn on all the others was because there was a common enemy there, a force greater to destroy. Still, for the words he's honestly grateful, coming from Natasha of all people, unexpected as that may be.

"Thank you," he says with honesty and a quiet sigh. "Really. Sometimes it's nice, to... to be reminded..."

That he's human.

[widows_kiss]

"I know," she answers quietly when he meets her gaze in one of those brief moments, because she does. She understands all too well. He's not the only one of the group that feels like a monster because of who and what he is, what he's done. She's perhaps not the best comparison, but she can still understand.

She hesitates, her thumb brushing light circles against the back of his hand, all to aware of the way his fingers have curved against her own. For a moment, she's not sure how much to say, but since they've started this conversation...

"I was there," she admits after a moment, glancing over the meet his gaze again. She wasn't sure how her honesty in this situation would be met, so she was carefully watching his reaction. "At Culver."

[hyperkinesia]

He figures she would. Not that he knows that much about Natasha's past, neither has he ever invested much of his time in trying to find out, but he knows just about enough to figure - well, they all have their ghosts, don't they? Some just linger more heavily around and inside them.

The words are met with surprise on his end, and some of it he can't really hide from his face either. His eyebrows arch as he looks back at her, shoulders tensing, and for a while he doesn't know what to say. Frankly, he doesn't even know what to think.

He bites the inside of his cheek and turns his gaze away, the one word enough to bring those memories back to the surface. Not a time he's particularly fond of, really. "For... SHIELD, I take it."

[widows_kiss]

"Fury didn't want Ross to get his hands on you. He didn't think that would turn out well for anyone," she confesses, watching him, watching his reactions, her own voice quiet. "Then again, I'd happily keep Ross from getting his hands on anyone or anything he's after. The man's a menace and an asshole and that's on his good days."

Natasha's not a fan.

"But I wanted you to know... I've been watching the Other Guy longer than you think. Although some of it didn't make sense until after New York. I had some free time on my hands just after that. It gave me a lot of time to think. And even back then... Well. I find it interesting that even when you lost your control in one of the most violent ways possible, you ignored all the innocent people that could have been caught in the crossfire and went specifically after the aggressors. Who'd, granted, picked the fight with you first. I don't believe that was accidental."

[hyperkinesia]

"He's right, it wouldn't," he answers promptly with a forced smile. "Ross had a tendency to underestimate him. It was a notion that was beyond him, that there's no cell that can contain the monster."

And the thing is, even if there is such a place, he would just turn angrier and angrier, he would become stronger, and grow larger until he was too big for any cage, and break its confines due to just his sheer size. Brute force is the same - weapons, missiles, bombs, nothing can stop the other guy. But Ross's mind was always one of a soldier, a general, an army man. His solution invariably turned to violence, and that was a field where the Hulk always had the advantage - which was an unfortunate thing as far as Bruce's concerned.

"That time, yes, because there was a specific aggressor. So he turned to the ones actively attacking him, and their weapons. That doesn't mean it was alright to hurt or kill however many soldiers were there, only following orders."

Innocent people in many ways too, with families and lives of their own.

[widows_kiss]

She's already shaking her head before he finishes his sentence. "No, it wasn't, but I doubt many of Ross's people could be termed innocent. And they had a choice to follow those orders or not. Considering everything they brought to fight on a college campus..." She made an inarticulate sound of disgust, shaking her head before hopping up on the counter beside him. "It was insanity. And yes, Ross is ultimately to blame, but they helped start that fight and placed it somewhere they never should have. If you're going to absolve them of blame because you think they had no choice, how is it any different for you, when they gave you no choice either?"

"Not to mention," she points out, sliding her hand against his arm lightly. "If you were just unstoppable rage, there would have been nothing keeping you from continuing to rampage once the specific aggressor was taken care of. Except you didn't finish that fight either. Made a mess, yes, but you left early. To protect another innocent."

Because yeah. She'd caught his abrupt departure too, even if she'd been unable to follow.

[hyperkinesia]

He can't really disagree on it, now that she presents it like that. To even think that starting a confrontation like that with the Hulk on such a public and crowded place is borderlining on insane, but then again most of Ross's plans were. Tactical as he thought them, they invariably turned sour when he added a threatening or violent component, and then was always so surprised to see the other guy jump out. The situation quickly slipping from his control as the monster did from Bruce's own, like anything else the general seemed to come up with. "I know. I know what you mean, I just..."

Despite the moment, the light touch of her hand to his arm, it's her last words that set visible tension on his shoulders. Another innocent. And the name flashes through his mind as so many times before, his heart clenches in a numb way he's almost - almost - used to by now.

But no comment from him on that either. He just nods, eyes lowered from Natasha, and he says simply. "No. No, you're right."

[widows_kiss]

He doesn't give much of a noticeable reaction to that, but she can still sense the flinch all the same. Some things are easier than others for her to read, interpret. Natasha reaches out, sliding her hand up his arm to rub lightly against his shoulder, her expression apologetic.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up."

wrapping this up here, y/n?

[hyperkinesia]

He doesn't pull away, though honestly right now it's more like he can't, not with whatever effect this place, this event is having on him. Still he doesn't quite keep the eye contact now, as he closes himself in again, almost as if putting an end to that conversation, or at least steering it in an entirely different direction.

"It's alright." He shakes his head, his tone definite. "Let's just... finish the sandwiches."

That works! Although now she's going to have to poke him again sometime soon to make up for it...

[widows_kiss]

She ducks her head in agreement, letting the subject drop without argument as she takes a bite of her sandwich again. But just because she's let the topic drop doesn't mean she doesn't still stick close, offering the comfort and contact he craves for as long as he wants it.