"You're gonna love it, Doc. We've got all the toys."

Only the sound of his shoe heels clicking quietly against the floor echoed as Bruce made his way through the hallways of the science department. In the multiple invitations he had gotten to join this place to become a potential "avenger", S.H.I.E.L.D. had offered several services such as a high-tech laboratory to continue his experiments and complete some of his researches. Bruce didn't exactly like the idea of joining but he needed a plan, somewhere to go and perhaps somewhere to more or less belong. As he slowly let the idea that he'd be residing here for a while sink it, he chose to explore said offered laboratories. There was a small disappointing feeling in how empty the science department felt compared to the rest of the academy. A few scientists passed by here and there but most of them were in their own rooms, running tests, taking blood samples, working on a new weapon... Bruce felt he'd probably be the only one enjoying the greatness of science and all the discoveries it brings. He hadn't seen a student around these parts yet but he tried to keep his hopes up.

The messy haired boy stopped short as he finally spotted the enormous doors that lead to the laboratory dedicated to his work. He knew that his work probably would take up quite some space but he wondered why he had gotten such a huge room for himself. Truthfully, he was starting to feel glad he'd have a space all for himself where he could find peace and quiet. It wasn't that he was anti-social but the sort of attitude he had towards people was the result of the terrible accidents that came from his own doings. As much as he wanted to socialize, there really wasn't many people to reach out to in his case. Bruce had to constantly think for everyone else's security.

Bruce stepped into the white room and stared in awe at the amazingly technological looking room. He was taken aback by how advanced everything seemed. He hadn't gotten the chance to lay his hands on such tools to work with for they were far to expensive but he had studied all about them and knew exactly what kind of tests he wanted to run and studies to start on. He rubbed his hands together and exhaled with a repressed excitement clearly plastered on his face.

"Alright, Banner, what will we try first?" He said to himself quietly. As ridiculous as it seemed, he felt like a child on christmas day. He ran his hand through his wavy, messy hair and looked around, seriously unable to decide just what exactly he wanted to start with. There was so many studies, so many calculations, too many tests to only pick one. If only he knew just what S.H.I.E.L.D. looked for from him and his knowledge, his choice would have been much easier.

The billionaire was walking around the school, playing with his Stark mobile, a smart phone he invented himself. He paid more attention to his device than to his surroundings. Anyways, he remembered all of the rooms and where they were located by heart, since he simply had to study the map for about an hour the night before. He passed by the dormitories. Red, green, blue and yellow. He felt like playing twister when he first saw the pictures of the dormitories in the academy’s pamphlets. He then passed the common showers. “Don’t we have showers in our dorm? I don’t want to take my shower with a bunch of other naked guys…” he thought to himself annoyed, still playing on his phone. He then pushed pass the doors which finally led him in the educational area of the academy. At his left was the gymnasium and at his right was the laboratory. He finally stopped looking at his phone and smiled to himself. “Found it.”

He opened the door of the lab. He was really curious about what he would find. He looked around and felt unimpressed. It was almost the same as his own, but there was something missing, according to Tony. “Maybe I could do a little modifications. Bring a little more of... me.”, he thought while inspecting his surroundings.

As the billionaire looked around, smiling to himself, he noticed the messy haired young man. He walked slowly to him and smiled.

"Hey, I'm Tony Stark", he let out a hand for the other to shake it. Tony was hoping the other was of his level of intellect and not a simple science noob who pretended to know the subject, while in fact he didn't know nothing about it.

"Hey, I'm Tony Stark" The sudden sound of the newcomer startled Bruce. He certainly hadn't expected anyone to come here. The young scientist, looked over his shoulder only to see a young dark haired man smiling right at him. Banner knew of the Stark family, everyone did. A family like them could not go unnoticed. Howard Stark was a genius and it was needless to say that Bruce greatly respected this man. Of course, Tony Stark was no unknown kid in this country either. Bruce turned around to face the other student and extended his arm to shake the other's hand. His big brown eyes scanned subtly Tony's features. The charisma this young man emitted was intimidating and his smile was unreadable. Bruce couldn't tell if he was genuine or not which made him a little nervous for that meant he couldn't tell what Tony wanted from him. Far too many people only wanted to use his "power" and torture him for experiments. It was quite messed up to think that the people who wanted to use him this way were mainly from the government.

"Bruce Banner."

Bruce gave Tony a weak smile and a small nod as he shook the other's hand. The messy haired scientist's face was so old looking for his age. After all his childhood and all the time he should've been enjoying his youth like the others had been taken up by the nightmare of living in the streets as a fugitive, leaving him with bags under his eyes, much less perfect features and a more mature attitude that simply didn't help Bruce in living up to his real age. Needless to say that he envied Tony's undeniably handsome looks and for being everything that he failed to be. Tony Stark radiated with an attitude that simply shouted proudly: "Look at me. I'm successful and you aren't. You want to be me and so does everyone else. I am Tony Stark, future head of Stark enterprise and I can hold the world in my hand if I want."

Starting to feel awkward and overwhelmed by the honor it was to meet him in person and so personally, Bruce turned towards the wide lab and smiled whole-heartedly, still excited at the idea to start working here and now, enthusiastic at the idea of working with a partner who just happened to be the son of one of America's greatest geniuses. Deep down, he hoped that Tony would know a bit about him and his work.

"This is a pretty great lab they they gave us, huh?" Bruce began walking around, sliding his hand gently against the lab tables.
"Let's just hope I don't blow this place up any time soon..." He thought. Killing Howard Stark's son would obviously be less than good publicity to get people to like Bruce and he absolutely didn't want the Stark family after him as well.

Tony remained silent when the other shook his hand. "Bruce Banner?" he pondered on the name. The name was familiar, but he couldn't put his finger on the name just yet. He was deep in thought. "Come on, Tony. Banner. Banner. Ban-" His thoughts got interrupted when the messy haired young man asked him a question.

"Hm, well, I've seen better", Tony said unimpressed. "But I guess that for a school, it is pretty 'great'."

He was now starring at the other man's features, posture. Bruce looked so innocent, so fragile. What was his ability? Was he even part of the students? Tony couldn't really imagine the man in front of him being a 'super hero'. Until now, he had met many interesting and different people in this school. He first met a professional archer, who was pretty fit and seemed to have no fears. Then, he met this drama queen who seemed pretty inoffensive to Tony at first. Well, no. He still kind of did. Though, now, the billionaire knew the god had many tricks under his sleeves. Tricks even Tony couldn't master. Finally, he met this psychopathic mercenary. The billionaire had his quota of impressive people for the day. He hoped Bruce was like him. Well not LIKE him, but somewhat like him. By that, it meant being a regular human. No mutations, no super powers. And by chance...

"Bruce Banner! Yes! I know you!" he suddenly got off of his thoughts. "You're the one who designed the Gamma Bomb!" he exclaimed, proud that he finally remembered. He was also very glad to be in the presence of another highly intelligent being.

"Better?" Bruce looked up towards Tony from across the room. He then remembered the other's rich background. 'Oh of course. The Stark family proba--"

He was cut short. Tony was suddenly exclaiming Bruce's full name with excitement. How odd this was. There he was, standing in a room with a billionaire... gazillionaire... or whatever he was. And the son of the famous Howard Stark was actually aware of his own work. He wasn't exactly having a fanboy moment since he didn't exactly enjoy the fact he was in this building, unsure of what S.H.I.E.L.D. asked of him. For now, the place seemed like a prison with... beautiful high-tech machines and lab materials... The whole thing was a confusing mess for Bruce. For the moment, he chose to just appreciate the thought his work was known by his new fellow science co-worker.

Bruce chuckled. "The bomb was called Banner Bomb actually... but... I'm not exactly happy with the results." His soft brown eyes looked around the room before landing straight to the floor.
"Destroying half of Manhattan and being top on the Military's wanted list wasn't exactly my plan...and the Hulk? ... Well..."
He ran his hand through his dark messy hair and chuckled sadly, disappointed. "I don't always get what I want."

And that was the moment where he prayed Stark wouldn't run away from him because of the monster that lives deep within him yet left him exposed like a nerve.

Tony shrugged. "Banner bomb, Gamma bomb. You get my point." His eyebrows then furrowed when he heard the other mention the Hulk.

"The Hulk? You mean the big green rage monster? You're the Hulk?!" He exclaimed in disbelief. He walked over Bruce and started to state at him up and down. Bruce looked too innocent, "Too cute", too innofensive, to be the Hulk. A slight smile was brought on his face.

"That's amazing! I usually don't really appreciate freaks with powers or whatever, but the Hulk! The Hulk is powerful! I've heard of what happened to Harlem.. And I was impressed. Don't feel bad though, Harlem isn't that important anyways", he paused and frowned. "I can't believe it's you though. Don't take it personally, but you're not exactly what I had expected of the Hulk's 'owner'."

Peter had taken to walking around and trying to actually taken in his surroundings for once. Usually everything was just a blur, between school saving people and taking care of aunt May it hardly gave him the time to appreciate the view of well…anything really. So this time round he simply relaxed and gazed at all the things this school had to offer. So far so good, he was more than impressed. Everything was so grand it was astonishing, he’d always been surrounded by the small things in life and to be now transported into a place that screamed luxury was foreign and yet exciting to him. After having left and explored the image even so far as to getting on a comfortable basis with it “You could say I had mouth to mouth with it. I think I drooled while I slept too…”

Peter was now doing a back and forth down and up the hall simply observing the ceilings, the walls, the doors, the floors and the little silver plaques that had the names of the rooms neatly printed on them. After venturing down the whole hallway, he decided he’d start visiting the rooms this time round starting by the laboratory.

He peered through the window and saw an endless amount of utensils spotless and ready to be used by capable hands. The brunette couldn’t deny that he was somewhat excited at the prospects of getting his hands on those but he refrained from jumping around goofily and simply let a content smile spread across his face. The boy clasped the handle and pushed roughly. He practically burst into the room, his eyes automatically scanning the area and taking everything in, only to stop and zone in on two other men who already seemed to occupy the area.

“Uh…am I interrupting something or…?”

Tony’s final comments made Bruce quite uncomfortable despite the other’s reassurance that he meant the opposite. The messy haired scientist didn’t exactly like being referred to as a “freak with a power”. But then he added what sounded like a admiring comment on his destruction of Harlem. That made Banner unsure of what to feel. Awkwardness was all he could manage, slight discomfort and a pinch of amusement. How Tony resembled a 5 year old child. Well… A child who knows he’d rule the world as easy as one two three and who thought losing a couple of lives and buildings like the ones in Harlem didn’t matter much. He was much like a child nonetheless.

Bruce took off his glasses and fiddled with them. It was a nervous tic he had when faced in a situation he didn’t know how to handle. This was a strange situation for him, specially since he cared about what Tony thought of him for Bruce looked up to his family’s work and fame yet the strange response he got from the heir of Stark Enterprise was simply disarming. He looked away and around the room for a few seconds and cleared his throat.

“Yeah… they all say that.” He tried to force a smile but his slight embarrassment twisted it into some mix of slight repressed annoyance and shyness. “But uh… Thanks.”

“Uh…am I interrupting something or…? »

The sound of a new younger voice echoing lightly in the small, silent and slightly uncomfortable conversation made Bruce raise his head up as he snapped out of his thoughts and turn towards where the cautious voice came from.

He blinked as he saw a very young looking man that stood by the doors of the lab. Bruce attempted to smile reassuringly.

“Uh No!” He turned to look at Tony for approval and back to the newcomer. “Not at all.”

Bruce slid his glasses into his shirt pocket as he walked towards him and reached his hand out for the other to shake.
“Bruce Banner.”

The way Bruce fiddled with his glasses and seemed so awkward amused Tony. Usually, he would be prone to tease socially awkward people like him, but ...the Hulk. He had to remember. Though, the scientist in front of him seemed to have been through a lot. He'd be more than simply being an asshole. He'd be cruel.

When Bruce thanked him, Tony could feel the slight annoyance in the other's voice. He was kind of disappointed at how the messy haired boy acted towards him though. He was usually well liked. Bruce gave off this attitude of mefiance. He was about to engage in another conversation to try to make things less awkward, but he got interupted right before he could open his mouth. The new comer surprised him a bit. How old could this kid be?

When Bruce looked at him for approval, he slowly nodded his head. The new comer WAS interupting him in a way. He was slightly annoyed, but remained polite and introduced himself after the messy haired man.

"And I'm Tony Stark. Nice to meet you. Though, I wonder, what would a kid like you do in a laboratory like this?" He had to ask. Just cause. Fuck you, he's Tony Stark.

He noticed the small man blinked and shift nervously looking toward his companion for approval which seemed to be met albeit reluctantly on the other man’s behalf. Though the smaller man reassured him that he wasn’t being disruptive he still felt like he had interrupted something important. “Maybe I should have just taken a look around and left without saying around? It would have made things waaaaaaay less awkward than they are now. Oh well I already got myself in the situation might as well man up and deal with the tenseness.”

His thoughts were interrupted when he noticed the smaller man, which had glasses just a moment ago, “Where did they go anyways?” was standing before him, arm extended in form of a handshake and introducing himself. Peter reached out to return the gesture while his eyes shifted over to look at the other man who seemed very familiar. He could tell the other man was assessing him but he visibly refrained from making any comments on him. Instead he also introduced himself as tony Stark which peter wasn’t oblivious to the weight the name carried; he actually greatly admired the brains behind the name. But Stark, instead of giving him a welcoming gesture or coming over to shake his hand personally, had seemed to scoff at him and belittle him by asking a rude question. “Well excuse me Princess!”

Though instead of responding in an indignant manner, the New Yorker simply turned back to Mr Banner, shook his hand twice for good measure, smiled complacently and in turn introduced himself.

“Nice to meet you Mr Banner” He let go of his grip then and his eyes shifted once again to the other man known as Stark. “I’m Peter Parker, nice to meet you both as well. As for what I’m doing here, well I’m interested in Biophysics. You know understanding the interactions between the various systems of a cell, including the interactions between DNA, RNA and protein biosynthesis, as well as how these interactions are regulated. You know that type of “sciency” thing.”

Tony scoffed when he noticed the new comer ignore him to introduce himself to the other first. He folded his arms bored. The billionaire was slightly annoyed as the attention was not on him for those slight seconds.

Then, when 'Peter' finally introduced himself, Tony faked a smile. Though, his smile became more real when the other started talking about his interests. Suddenly, the boy didn't seem so annoying and useless to the billionaire. He seemed extremely smart, especially for his age. Tony came forward.

"Ah really? I gotta say, I'm impressed. I wouldn't expect someone like you would know so much about biophysics", he said smiling, not seeming to be aware of how insulting he could be. "I'm more interested in in electrical and computer engineering though, but I know a lot about the subject", he finished, finally holding a hand in front of the other as a proper introduction manner.

Feeling an odd tension in the air between the two other guys that stood in this lab with him, Bruce could only stand there, shifting his weight from one leg to the other, fiddling with his fingers. He looked up at Peter once he began speaking of his work and research. A small smile appeared on his face while listening to him. How relieving it was to finally be with boys of his age and get to talk normally… well what he’d consider normal. Because let’s face it, the strange slang teenagers use these days sounded a bit primitive to the young scientist. Not that he thought less of the popular kids and pop culture, he simply felt much more comfortable using the scientific terms he wanted to use when talking rather than having to simply everything so the others could understand. Obviously, back in high school, after kindly taking the time to translate his scientific gibberish into “normal English” for his classmates, he’d be called a weirdo in the hallways despite his consideration for their understanding. Bruce didn’t exactly love inconsiderate people.

So finally, he met whom he could now call his co-workers and continue his research in Gamma Radiations and for now, secretly continue his research on discontinuing his… condition. But that, Bruce decided to keep off his mind for now. He didn’t want to speak of his creation the BannerBomb to the others right now even if he knew the possibility of them knowing of it. They WERE scientists too after all. They certainly knew a thing or two about the creation... and the dangerous results.
“And I did research on Gamma Radiations for the U.S. military. I’m also a doctor.”

He felt a bit awkward spilling this out there without mentioning the Big Guy to Peter but he figured that he’d meet him soon enough.
He rubbed his hands together and sighed in content and looked around the Lab.

“Well! I’m going to start testing out the equipment… have a look at it, if you both don’t mind doing so?” He looked at the two other young men with careful eyes. Bruce began stepping towards a station where multiple laser machines and various machines that seemed to be scanners of some sort. He began typing away oh them, opening and getting them ready to go. Bruce took out his pair of glasses and slid them on before looking up with big innocent eyes at the two others.
“Did you guys have any research plans for today? Anything you wanted to work on? … I offer my help if needed.”

He nodded and smiled. It really was good to have these two around.

Peter looked on as the two men smiled at him; he could sense that Tony had been clearly unimpressed by him that is until he related his passion for Biophysics. Peter could practically see that spark going off in the man’s eyes, one that spoke of a common enrapture in the subject of physics. A small part of the teenager swelled with pride at the awe the older man seemed to be of him. For most of his school years Peter was not treated too kindly, the school environment was nothing short of a living hell. Students picked up called him names such as “PunyParker” not only was it humiliating but it had been terribly lonely and harder to cope with ever since his Uncle’s death. So being recognized? Being told he was impressive? Yeah it kind of boosted his ego. “Hey it’s not like I’m greedy and want the world to fall to my feet but sometimes it feels good to just be appreciated…a poor little spider can feel lonely at times too you know.”
T
he web-head was even more surprised when a hand was extended toward him as a kind and proper gesture of “welcome”. Peter grinned and grasped the hand firmly in his own giving it a good shake and nodding his head in order to demonstrate that he had understood the other. He felt good and at ease, especially considering he was surrounded by men who shared the same passions as him.

After letting go of Tony’s hand, Peter leaned back against a desk and looked at the other man he had earlier addressed and noticed the subtle shift in his features as if he was hesitant to speak of something but after a few tense moments he finally opened his mouth and spoke. “U.S. Military, Gamma Radiation? Man that sounds big, way too big for an 18 year old guy…what exactly did the Military want out of that research? Oh yeah he’s still talking, focus!”

Peter shook himself of his thoughts and looked as Bruce shifted shyly after mentioning his status. “I’m pretty sure there’s nothing wrong with being a Doctor at that age! Quite the contrary this guy must be a genius!”

He looked as the man then went to type away on the machines and busying himself away, all the while a glimmer of pure genuine joy surrounding him. It was when his eyes met with the Doctor’s framed one’s that he realized that he had landed exactly where he belonged, all the nervousness coiled tightly inside of him was simply let loose at that very moment and he let himself relax and breathe a sigh of relief. He headed to where Bruce was busy setting up the machinery and stood next to him.

“I didn’t have anything in mind, but Doc you can throw anything at me.” He turned back toward Tony and smiled challengingly “What about you?”