Hulk Read Free Page A

pointed at her fiercely—“you have to shut up. You have to keep it to yourself, or they’ll take him away from us, lock him in a room, and dissect him. Me, too, for that matter. If you say you love him . . .”
    “Of course I love him,” Edith said desperately. “He’s my son!”
    “He’s more mine than yours. That much is certain.” He drew in a deep breath and let it out, rising from the edge of the bed and wiping away a coat of sweat from his forehead. “Edith, I had . . . have . . . theories. Things I wanted to work on involving mutations . . . mutagens. Tinkering on a genetic level that would allow the body to heal itself . . .”
    “I don’t understand,” she said. “What does that have to do with anything . . . ?”
    He turned to face her and, his words laden with the heaviness that can only come from a great unburdening, he told her, “They wouldn’t let me use human subjects.”
    She stared for a long moment, her growing disbelief obvious. “You . . .” She couldn’t speak above a whisper. “You . . . experimented on Bruce?”
    He rolled his eyes. “No, of course not.”
    “Then . . . what . . . ?” And then she got it, her hand fluttering to her mouth. “On yourself. Oh, my God, David. You . . . you did something to yourself.”
    “Yes.”
    “Before we conceived Bruce. Conducted experiments on yourself.”
    “Yes.”
    “Oh, my God,” and she looked in the general direction of Bruce’s bedroom. “He . . . you passed it on to him.”
    “Yes,” he said once more.
    Edith turned to him, grabbing at his arms. “Get it out of him! Whatever’s been done to him, cure him! You’ve got to!”
    “And I intend to,” David lied to her.
    “Is it possible?”
    “Yes,” he lied once more. And now it was his turn to take her by the arms and draw her close. “But it stays between us. Otherwise . . .”
    “They’ll take him away. I know. And you’re right. And I’ll trust you, David, to do right by Bruce, because I know you love him. It explains so much . . . so much . . .” And then she looked up at him, her eyes flashing fire. “If you fail him, David—or if you hurt him in any way—I swear to God, I’ll kill you.”
    “I understand,” he said, and he truly did. The problem was she didn’t. But she would.
    Eventually she would, if it was the last thing she did.

instinct
    David Banner was just checking the readings on the latest cyclotron experiment when he saw General Thunderbolt Ross barreling toward him. Banner took a deep breath to calm himself and forced a smile, even though his immediate instinct was to head the other way.
    Instead, he said, with a joviality he didn’t feel, “Why, hello, General. The new rank sits well on you, I have to say.”
    “In my office, Banner,” Ross said without preamble.
    Banner rose from his workstation, and pointed at the cyclotron. “This might not be a good time, General. We’re right in the middle of accelerating the atomic nuclei of gamma part—”
    “Do I appear to care, Banner?” He took a step closer, his mustache bristling. He was a barrel-chested man with graying hair cut to regulation army shortness, and the brusque manner of one who has nothing but distaste for civilians, since they didn’t take well to orders. “It will keep. Now get over to my office, on the double.”
    “Very well,” said Banner coolly after a moment’s consideration. “Lead the way.”
     
    “Get out of the way.”
    Bruce Banner was playing in the street with his friend Davy when suddenly a bigger boy, whom Bruce had seen around from time to time, blocked their path. His name was Jack, as Bruce recalled, and although to an adult he would have looked like a child, to a child he looked like a giant.
    Bruce knew that he was no danger to the boy. Jack was far wider than Bruce, and taller, and Bruce was a skinny and unthreatening four-year-old even under the best of circumstances. He did precisely as he was ordered.
    The bigger boy smiled lopsidedly,