Chapter 24 : The One with Bruce in an Apartment (Patreon)

Disclaimer - The rights of the respective characters are with their respective owners. I don’t mean to violate their intellectual property rights and thus, only my original characters are my IP. 

The Sage of the Mind: Chapter 24

Manhattan [December 2008]

–Bruce Banner–

His eyes snapped open as he sat up from the ridiculously comfortable bedding he was provided with, at least compared with the ones he used before he was chased away from everything he ever knew by the Military.

He sighed and sat on the bed, his head hung low as he thought of everything that had happened in the past two weeks. It flashed through his mind at speeds that normal people would struggle to comprehend.

He had always been blessed. He didn’t really understand how children his age didn’t derive Newton’s laws just from idle observation, hence the ostracism he faced as a child and even as a teenager in high school.

He would like to think that they were just intimidated by his intelligence but the truth was that he was a…nerd. Yes, he was a quintessential nerd representing the qualities that attracted Jocks as if they were bees and he was pollen.

But he trudged on. He endured the bullying and the taunts until he finally reached college, having graduated high school early. That was when he finally met people who could somewhat understand him and his thoughts. He had been elated beyond measure and after that, he worked on his master's, then his Phd, and then another Phd.

He engrossed himself in academia until he met her. Betty Ross.

How could someone like Ross ever fathered someone like Betty Ross was beyond him, something that could not ever be explained by science. And yet, there she was, working on something that required his expertise and he had been more than happy to help her.

He hadn't really expected for it to turn into anything else, other than a perfectly normal joint research project but somewhere along the way, as their research collaboration deepened, feelings sprouted in both of their hearts. 

Well, he had fallen for her much earlier than she did but he was elated that it finally happened. He vowed to himself that he wouldn’t let anything happen to their relationship and then…..

He rubbed his face and stood up, looking at the massive empty bedroom along with the equally massive living room that he knew was empty as well.

It was part of the accommodations that the Invisible Man had arranged for him.

When he was told that he would be given a safe place to live, along with all the necessities, he had nearly broken down in relief. For someone like him, a complete and utter civilian, to have lived the life of a fugitive for weeks, was so much mental pressure that he didn’t know how he didn’t kill himself long before.

‘I know why’ he thought to himself darkly before he banished those thoughts. Now was not the time for that.

For the past two weeks, he had been staying in this cozy apartment that came with everything paid for, along with groceries that arrived every other day for him, courtesy of the Invisible Man directly.

He had stayed away from open windows and devices with cameras and made sure that he never came out of his apartment as was instructed by the Invisible Man because he had some things to arrange before Bruce could come out in the open.

But now that he had some time to think about it, he didn't really know what to do with that option.

On one hand, it would be his right to live freely, with his own identity, out in the open, without the threat of military imprisonment and experimentation hanging over his head but on the other hand…last week had been nice.

He didn’t get to go out but he had a TV and a computer he could use to browse the general internet, he didn’t want to set off any alarms by searching for highly specific information. Cat Videos were something that amused him incredibly, making the boring lunches he could make for himself that much more tolerable.

Eventually, he had looked for recipes online and started making better food for himself other than plain sandwiches and meatloaf. Now, he could make pizza, mashed potatoes, turkey, chicken, salads, bread, and whatnot. 

It was nice…..to do things slowly, without a sense of urgency in every single action he performed.

He slowly brushed his teeth, looking at his unkempt self. To be honest, he didn’t really have the wish to shave at all. He felt lethargic most of the time.

IT got incredibly boring to watch movies and TV series after the first few days because most of the movies could be categorised into finite sections and even guessing which movie would go into which category got boring after the first couple of tries.

The internet access definitely helped but it would get very hard to control himself from looking at stuff that would definitely be flagged, so he refrained from using that much.

He had a gym in the apartment that he tried to use but it was actually nearly useless to him. Ever since he got his powers, apart from stress, his heart rate never really went up, even if he performed strenuous exercises for long periods of time.

It was one such bonus of the other guy, he thought to himself.

He had met a grand total of one person in the past two weeks and that was the doorman who came to drop off the groceries at the door. That was it.

The Invisible Man had promised him resources to help look for a cure but that had not arrived but he did not want to bother him, so he had not said anything about that.

Anyway, he had been meditating a lot in the time he had been alone and that had helped him sort out the jumbled mess of thoughts that had plagued his mind ever since the other Guy came into his life.

After getting ready, he sat down on the dining table, munching on an apple, as he watched his scribblings from last night’s research session. Not having the luxury of typing anything in the digital world, he had resorted to writing with pen and paper.

His brain had been buzzing with ideas ever since it realised that he was in a safe space, so he had been just writing endlessly in his free time, which was all the time since he only had to cook twice a day. That much was enough to sustain him.

He had a washer-dryer combo in the apartment itself so he didn’t have to go anywhere for the laundry.

“Sigh What has my life come to,” he mumbled to himself as he once again began writing, on the fourth such notebook in the past two weeks alone.

They were a list of ideas through which he could try and cure himself of his affliction. However, calling it an affliction and not a curse would be doing it a disservice.

He had a nightmare the first night he slept here and woke up to find his arm almost green and had to concentrate really hard on the fact that he was safe, in the domain of the Invisible Man, and only after a tense minute or two, did the green glow recede slowly, painfully slowly.

That was the last time he had turned green, even partially. Ever since then, he made sure to get in a nice workout, even though he didn’t feel tired the thought counts, and then a nice heavy dinner with a bout of meditation before sleeping, not before turning on whale sound for better sleep.

And it worked, like a charm. He could not believe that the internet guide for sleeping better worked on him as well but he was grateful for that.

He had an idea but once again, that idea required equipment that he simply didn’t have.

“Um, uh, Hey, Invisible Man?” He looked up at the ceiling, feeling stupid immediately when he heard the pencil’s scratching voice.

He looked down and chuckled as the word “Yes?” was written on one of his spare notebooks, though looking at it, he was running dangerously low on notebooks.

“Um, not that I am not grateful for all this, I am, really. But when will the equipment be ready? I understand if there are some problems. Just a timeline will do. I am already burdening you-”

“...Stop. I have someone who can solve most of your problems. That person is currently unavailable. As soon as that happens, I will let you know. Now, I know it is not the ideal scenario but the moment you come into outside contact, they might trace you back.” The pen furiously scribbled as he read the words.

His shoulders slumped as he realised that the invisible Man was right.

“Although I could take care of any retaliation they could send your way, the mere sight of so many armed people might send you and your alter ego into a frenzy, something we can’t have in a civilian population. I have my limitations as well, otherwise I would have sent you to the person directly. Just wait a few more days, alright?”

“...Okay,” He muttered and watched as the notebook and the pencil both dropped from mid-air, on the study table.

Okay, so the Invisible Man had someone who could help. 

Who could it be?

Someone with extraordinary powers like himself? Or a scientist who could help him?

What did he mean by his “alter ego”?

The Other guy was the Other Guy and he was him. There was no connection between them.

The Other guy was just a mass of rage, hate, destruction, and power while he was just..Bruce Banner. Someone with non-existential muscles and a big head.

There was no way that the Other Guy was some part of his own mind.

Right? Right?