Book One: A Wolf Among Beasts

Chapter Five

Bruce is sort of sleeping when Eli returns, she could have done it quietly, snuck back but she figured it was better to announce her arrival with cracking and snapping branches, so as not to alarm him. He's laying on the blanket she'd left him on, he shifts and glances to her, she smiles sheepishly and shrugs a little.

"Lay with me" he tells her, she nods a little taking the space next to him, closer then before, he threads his fingers with hers and takes a deep breath. "It was a lab accident" he admits. "I am...." he pauses. "Was" he corrects. "A scientist...an expert in Bio-engineering and Gamma Radiation..." he takes a breath. "I made a stupid decision. A mistake. And it back fired...it changed everything about me and gave me this....alter-ego" he sees it the second it happens, recognition. It crosses her face like wildfire and he hates it. He liked being invisible to her. He liked being just Bruce.

"You're Dr Banner?" she asks, he stares at her. His heart sinks with his shoulders. "The...big green...." he nods. "That's....amazing" he lifts his eyes to hers.

"Amazing?" he asks. "How is any of it amazing?" he snaps a little, she stares back at him.

"No, not...the accident and stuff" she answers. "I just mean....do you have any idea what it's like to see that someone can do what you do?" she asks. "That there is someone out there like you? For years I thought....I was the only one, my brothers....they are mutants too...but...they can't fully change into animals....and there have only ever been two other people, that change form, not into a wolf but..I've never met someone else that can do that.....three people" she corrects slightly. "And to find out that you didn't have control....I struggled for so long with control over the wolf....seeing you on the news, see him.....I felt..." she looks down. "That I wasn't the only one" she whispers. "That's what I meant"

"Eli" he softens slightly, she cocks her head a little.

"I could help" she offers. "With control" she glances to him. "Techniques I've picked up..."

"It's not an emotion thing, well part of it is" he offers. "But it's more a heart rate thing" he pulls up his sleeve to show his watch, showing his current heart rate. "When it gets too high, he comes out"

"Do you trust me?" she asks softly, he looks to her and nods.

"More then anyone" he admits. "And that's...crazy" he chuckles a little. "3 months, I've only known you 3 months"

"I told you...." she whispers leaning closer to him. "We're connected, I felt it the first moment I saw you" She takes his hand and places it over her heart. He shifts closer and frowns a little.

"Your heart rate..." he whispers.

"I learnt to lower my resting heart rate" she tells him. "When it increases....it's still within the normal range....the wolf pushes, but can't get out, not unless I let it, now I have a problem with my adrenaline but I'm working on that too" she shifts closer still to him. "You're just a few steps behind me" she tells him. "Let me help you" he worries his hands together, he wants to, he does, mostly as it means she'll be close to him but for the control too. "Just as friends" she offers softly, undertone of sadness but she understands. She spent so long alone because of her fear of her wolf, that she knows how he feels. "Promise" he nods a little.

"It's not that I don't....like you" he adds. "Now I sound like a teenage boy" she smirks a little and shakes her head.

"No, no you're fine" she lays back at his side and takes a deep breath. "I get it...." he looks to her and then away again, the other guy shifting in his mind, wanting to be closer to her. Bruce pulls Eli closer, wrapping an arm around her, she shifts slightly and rests her head on his chest, her ear over his heart, he strokes her back and then curls his hand around her waist.