I love you all.
When I got back from my cabin this morning and checked my email, there were 3 alert messages, 3 favourites, and a review! Do you know how happy that makes me? :D Thanks!
That was a quicker update than the last, right? I apologise in advance if the next one takes longer.
Disclaimer: Not mine, duh.
To say Bruce Banner was furious was an understatement. He was so mad it drove him to distraction, nearly setting off an explosion in the process.
"How could he?" He asked aloud while working on his project. "How could he?" Bruce could feel the Other Guy close to the surface, and pushed his anger downwards. He hadn't 'hulked out' yet, but there had been a few close calls.
It was selfish of him, but the doctor was disappointed that he had lost the only person on the face of the Earth who wasn't scared of him. The void that Tony had seemed to fill was even more expansive now, threatening to drag Bruce down into the depths of depression.
But he stayed above the chasm, working on the edge. One slight gust of wind could knock him down. But he liked it that way, liked the danger he faced daily.
He knew he must've looked like a madman to anyone watching the security cameras; wild eyes, working fervently on a project no one else knew about. But the only one watching the cameras was Jarvis, and Bruce was sure that he would've seen a lot of crazy things in his existence, being Tony Stark's AI.
To say Bruce Banner didn't know what he was doing was an understatement. He had no fucking clue what half the stuff he was using even did, nevermind what using them did to his project. Tony really had invented some wacky stuff in his time down at the lab. But Bruce knew that there was some way for this to work, and he had to finish it before the funeral.
When was the funeral? Four days.
He only had four days for his machine to work. That was a little over half of a week.
He swore he would finish it in time, or die trying.
Tony was worth that. The only person who wasn't afraid of him had died for the sake of the people, and Bruce would die for Tony. He was sure that the 'Jolly Green Giant' (as Tony had called him) would agree that Tony was well worth it.
So he worked, and worked, and worked. Nobody came to check on him, not even Pepper. But Bruce didn't blame her. He didn't blame anyone. Well, anyone other than himself. But he was always blaming himself for something, so he was used to it. Used to the heavy weight set upon his shoulders for all eternity, or at least until he died.
He smiled when his project began to glow, emanating an unearthly blue light not unlike that of Tony Stark's arc reactor. This had to work, Bruce wouldn't accept anything less. If it didn't work, nothing would.
What was his project? Simple. It was a reviver, made especially for people with arc reactors in their chests. Namely Tony. If he used the reviver like a defibrillator, it should send an electrical current into his body and restart his heart. If you could call the arc reactor a heart.
There was a chance that nothing would happen, that all of the doctor's work was for nothing. He had to try, though. he couldn't just give up on the Iron Man. Unlike everyone else on the team, Tony had built his way into SHEILD. Natasha and Clint had been trained, but Tony didn't get any training whatsoever. No magical hammer, no super-soldier serum, just materials and a dream.
Even if you hated the guy, Bruce thought. You'd have to give him credit for building all of those suits.
Bruce rested his head on one of the tables scattered across the room. He was so tired, so . . . exhausted. Would it be okay if he just rested here for a moment? Just a few seconds, and then I'll get right back to work, he promised himself.
He hadn't slept in three days, hadn't rested or eaten. Every once in a while, Jarvis would remind him that eating kept him awake for longer, and was necessary to human survival, but the doctor ignored him.
It is so peaceful right here, he thought. So calm, and quiet. Surely it would be okay if I just took a ten-minute nap? To this his body agreed. So he let himself drift, higher up into the clouds, forgetting about everything that had happened in the past week. Sleep covered him like a thick blanket, and he welcomed it.
"M'ter B'nn'r?" A voice called through the haze, lifting the blanket off of him. "Master Banner?" It called again, and something prodded him in the side.
He gave a jolt of surprise, and flung his head up. "Mmmf?" When he saw no one, he put his head back down on the table.
"Master Banner?" The eerily robotic voice tried again. The voice sounded oddly monotone, perhaps even sad.
Bruce recognized the voice as Jarvis', and, irritated at being awoken, snapped, "what?"
"You instructed me to wake you exactly thirty minutes after you fell asleep. It has been thirty minutes." The AI responded, turning the lights a little higher.
Bruce faintly remembered what Jarvis was describing. When he first came into the lab, he knew he would be working on something for a long period of time. He hadn't thought of making the reviver yet. But somehow, he had this . . . feeling. So he told Jarvis to wake him thirty minutes after he fell asleep; if he even did.
Bruce sighed, he wanted, no, needed sleep. But he needed to finish the reviver. Sleep could wait, he decided. Tony couldn't.
Only 935 words that time. Ugh. Oh well.
I apologize for not responding to your reviews; life is busy, and usually without internet.
Notice: I will be popping back and forth to my cabin (which has no internet) every once in a while. This will affect my updates. The good news is that I will bring my iPod and notepad along so that I can work on this story.
Reviews are always amazing, and encourage me to write more. They give me a little extra 'oomph', if you know what I mean.