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Acceptance	By : ScereyahaDreamweaver Category: Marvel Verse Movies > Avengers, The Views: 3928 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Marvel (nor the avengers, nor science boyfrinds), It's fandom, nor theses characters, just this interpretation of their relationship, I make no money from this.

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Bruce looked around the empty lab. It was white and silver, cold and clinical looking, but the air was warm enough and there was nothing entirely professional about his company; Just two scientists testing a hypothesis with no one else to get in the way or be endangered. He breathed deeply as he sat on the table. It was actually quite reminiscent of the late nights they spent in labs in the pocket universe where they had gone to school together. They used to sneak behind the teachers to use the lab equipment and technology for assorted purposes of their own, but now the lab was Anthony’s and he was his guest, lab assistant and -more recently- experiment.

He tried not to think of himself as an experiment -as the failed experiment- as he removed his shirt. It felt odd to be removing his clothing in this context, especially willingly. Normally, when he was being experimented on, it was not by choice and whatever clothing had been taken off of him was not voluntary either. Though, by now, he could not really say that he was not entirely used to waking up naked, and often disoriented, feeling any number of things ranging from guilt and regret, to violation and moral outrage, it all got a bit old at some point. He had no misgivings about the company; really, if there was someone who he did trust -as a friend and competent scientist- it would have to be Anthony, but he was experiencing some apprehension about what he had agreed too.

The equipment seemed to loom at him, and there was an oddly sinister look about the needles laid out on the little metal table. It had taken some coaxing and many assurances that he could get up and walk away at any given time, despite being strapped down as a safety precaution. The adhesive pads on the electrodes felt cold as they were stuck to him. Little conductive tags, with conductive jelly-like adhesive, attached to fine wires, carrying the signals from his body to a machine, every one of his own chemical and physical nuances being interpreted and displayed by a computer. The computer made him nervous; the cold calculating, unfeeling thing that it was, it would have no regard for him, nor Anthony. It would hold nothing back to save face; nor to make him less uncomfortable. It would compromise him in every way in a moment, in a heartbeat, because that was what it was designed to do. That was the point, what he had agreed to. He watched where they were being stuck to avoid making eye contact. Anthony’s fingers were warm and rough on their tips. The man’s eyes traced this way and that across him, visually locating the best places to put the little conductive stickers. When the pads were in place, he watched Anthony double check all the wires before looking up at him. He was sitting a bit higher than Anthony was, so finally it was Bruce with the few inches of height advantage over his friend, who seemed to be -in every way- larger than life. Anthony gave him a small reassuring smile, before stepping away. Bruce lay back on the table slowly. The metal was cold against his back and he wondered briefly if it would really matter whether or not there were a soft padding added to it, for safety reasons, or for the experiment.

“This might pinch a bit.” Anthony said holding up a needle to insert the intravenous tube, his voice coming as a relief in the -all too- quiet lab.

“Uh, I’d feel better if you did up the restraints first." he admitted, feeling sheepish.

“Not afraid of needles are you?" he asked, but put down the needle and walked over to the straps on the table.

“It’s not the needles I’m afraid of." he said unnecessarily.

He supposed it was a mild, laughable extension of his other problem. It was hard for him to override his natural instinct against allowing himself to be physically damaged, and he supposed some people were just like that. It was not that he was afraid of needles, so much as afraid of his own impulsive reaction to them, and at times what was in them -or that they could be stealing his blood to be weaponized- to be perfectly fair. It just would not do for him to flinch or automatically jerk away. His naturally strong fight instinct had served him far better in other situations than this, especially before his exposure to a gamma bomb.

“We’re taking every precaution, remember?" he assured him.

Normally he would be a little less verbally accommodating, but he did not want his friend to get up and leave before he got any tests done.

This one was simple. A bit of adrenalin, and some cortisol, and then some other small dosage of different naturally occurring neuro-chemicals to see what would calm down the effect. The machine would keep the levels steady, never adding more than they needed to, and measuring how much of it was being metabolized out of his system, plus how much of it was being counteracted by other hormones. The next one was going to be emotional context. They were going to put him in front of a slideshow of images, add a bit of a few stress hormones and carefully measure the effect everything had. After that was a physical stress test. Of course, each test started by measuring his baseline levels and normal reactions, so Anthony let the computer have the time it needed to take its preliminary readings now.

Normally lying down on a table to be injected with random things would be enough to cause a problem on its own. Bruce hated labs and injections for a good reason, based on a long history of bad experiences. This was Anthony though. Anthony would not dose him with anything dangerous, or risk hurting him, or pushing him too far. He, if nothing else, trusted that his friend knew what he was doing and cared enough to not do anything too risky. More than that, he trusted himself not to find a cause to be truly angry with him, at least currently. He had learned over the years that it was primarily anger that made him dangerous, even as the hulk. He could, now at least, be under almost any normal stressful conditions, so long as the right emotional context kept his brain chemistry tweaked the right way; not that he often faced only a normal level of stress. Even when rampaging and green, he was not -if they had not actually done something to make him angry- really given to hurting anyone on purpose, at this point. This did not make them exempt from accidental damage, however, and so he still had some misgivings about this whole thing. Many people were eager to tell him that he was reasonable or careful enough, or that he was not such a problem in his altered state, but they did not see or feel what it was like in his head. He wanted to believe what they were saying, that he was too hard on himself, but he had also seen the future, or what it could be, and it was terrible enough to make him doubt anything that could be said, no matter how much he wanted to let go of that doubt, he had seen too much. He was trying to hold tightly to what he wanted to be able to believe, not just because he needed to have hope from time to time, but also -mostly- for Anthony’s sake. What they had both seen of their possible futures still scared him, but it seemed so far away from where he was now. Here in this time, with Anthony, he felt as though maybe they could make the right choices, as if they could become something other than what fate had in mind, if for no other reason than seeing how unwilling Anthony was to accept anything else.

For, and despite, all these reasons he had come to finally agree to this. Little tests to figure out what his exact limits were, mentally and physically, in a safe environment, so that they could work on finding a way to expand the safe limits and give him a better sense of control over himself and his life.

“Let’s start with the adrenaline.” said Anthony, taking effort not to sound eager.

Of course, they had decided to test his reactions by using synthesized chemicals, since he did not actually want to hurt him to evoke a response, not to mention that one of the chemicals they were testing this time was oxytocin. It could get awkward enough as it was, if they let it. That was not likely, however, as Anthony was far too interested in the science of it. His curiosity would fight tooth and nail against the possibility of feeling awkward.

“Uh… not too heavy handed with that?” He was straining slightly to try to make eye contact.

“You’re in good hands." he assured him as he pressed a button for the first dose.

Bruce closed his eyes. He felt the all too familiar feeling of adrenalin speed up his heart and make him flush. Feeling a bite of fear as it happened did not really help him in his attempts to feel any more comfortable with this. He thought it must have been because he was anticipating it, that he actually felt it flow through him, feeling like the crawling electric signals that were once believed to be the way nerves communicated, before science came to discover that all the signals were chemical. Suddenly everything felt more acute, and everything smelled stronger. Admittedly, the lab was relatively free of smells, except for Anthony and that slightly acrid-sweet smell of disinfectant; and what he was feeling was limited to the table at his back, the leads, and his clothes.

“How are you feeling?” Asked Anthony.

“Uh… a little nervous. Is, ah… everything alright?" he said honestly, asking for a little reassurance.

“We’re good.” Anthony said confidently.

“Just a slightly stronger reaction than predicted." he assured him.

“Could you try to be a little less flippant about this?” Asked Bruce, mildly put off by his arrogant seeming confidence.

A hand left the screen long enough to rest on his shoulder for a second. He breathed deeply, trying to relax. He knew that was Anthony’s way of trying to reassure him, without letting his tendency to use aggravating language get in the way.

A small spike of oxytocin, a minute amount of dopamine and some other less notable changes, ran across the screen; despite that he had not yet touched the associated dials. He felt bad for Bruce. He understood why. They were both isolated in so many ways, even a little human contact affected them more strongly than it normally would. Ordinarily he was better at not dwelling on it, but now he was having it spelled out for him, precisely, on the screen with percentages and minute fluctuations. He wondered exactly how his own brain chemistry fluctuated around his friend. Before the silence could get awkward, he went on with his testing.

Anthony watched the readings change in response to the spike, and it looked like promising results. He decided then to test everything else first, saving the most promising looking test for last.

~*~
A note from the author:
Yes, I am updating more now, just a couple more snippets as a preview of what's to come, since -you know- that iron man movie is coming out today and I'm sure looking for stories like this is going to be the first thing people do when they get home today ;p
Hopefully it's smooth reading so far, and I haven't been teasing you too long... Please review!
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Acceptance