Hulk-demic

Chapter 6 "Seconds like hours"

Banner awoke, it was several days since his collapse. Next to him was the soft warmth of Betty Ross. When he passed out a few days ago, she brought him back to his small room and tended to his head wound. In that moment of triage was also a kind of intimacy they had both been longing for since they met. The world they lived in now didn't seem to provide space for this sort of tenderness. Yet, maybe that was why it happened at all, just to prove it could.

Steps from where he lay to Betty Ross: 0.

Whether it was his head wound or his over-all exhaustion (mental and/or physical) he had slept for over 12 hours after his fall. In the days since then, he and Ross seemed to be moving on their own. At this point Ross was committed to finding a way to kill these things. Their prisoner just waited.

General Ross had waiting on his plans as well, but today was the day—men were taking the last jeep out to the base to recover the tiny hidden atomic bomb there. Compared to Oppenheimer's children this was a pip-squeak. However, nothing compared to Banner's Gamma Radiation Bomb. Oppenheimer spent the rest of his life trying to take back what he did, fighting for peace and diplomacy and decrying the bomb's use. Now, it was Bruce whose life was remorse.

Ross – a man with famously no patience – had given Bruce a couple of days to advance his idea of a cure, medical or psychological. But even Bruce had to admit that with every passing hour the potential pandemic might worsen (Ross shouted, "The entire world could be dying by now!"). He tried numerous times to get their prisoner to talk again, but it never did.  Did the creature ever speak, or had it been a hallucination? Betty told him point blank that he was clinically depressed. Maybe the General was right, the stress was just too much for him.

So, he joined Ross and with Rick's help, they had devised a new version of the Gamma Radiation Bomb, one that might balance the scales of the gamma radiation. Best-case scenario—the mutations would be reversed. Or, failing that, they calculated it so that it should at least kill anyone already poisoned by the first blast. Or, it could do nothing. Or, there was also a chance it could somehow aggravate this condition, making the monsters even bigger, stronger, and totally invincible.

"Will the atomic blast kill any that are nearby?" Ross wanted to know. Rick had done some calculations. If spontaneous regeneration was necessary for the creatures to survive their own physical change AND if bullets bounce of their skin, given that a bullet travels a millimeter in about one hundredth of a second, "therefore it's a good guess that for something to have a chance of damaging one of these creatures, the damage itself must occur faster than that..."

Ross was not a stupid man, he knew that for scientists and engineers math was another language. But, as a military tactician, he needed to know effects. Gruffly, he repeated, "So, will it?!"

"There's a chance, " Bruce offered. "But they would probably have to be right at the center of the blast, and this test bomb's blast radius is no more than a kilometer."

Ross said, "Then if we can we should detonate in Kirbyville. In the very least we could take out dozens of the bastards."

"We'll never get that far..." Banner worried out loud.

"Maybe not," Ross pulled out a cigar he had been carrying recently in his top breast pocket. "But men aren't afraid to try, Banner. You see this cigar? It's the last one I got. I have been saving it for weeks, and when I see this bomb go off, I'm smoking it, the rest of you be damned!" And plans were finalized.

The last jeep, with a crew of 5 men, set out at dawn. When Banner awoke they were already gone. He had given the men one thing to help. From their prisoner they realized that the things were highly radioactive, giving out a dangerous amount of gamma radiation. The lab had a couple of portable Geiger counters. He told them, "If one gets within a hundred meters of you, this thing should go off."