Ask me anything

[feldman]

 kernezelda asked: "*waves* you may have explored this in fic, but how does Bruce feel about the three varied invitations he's received to live with and work in/hide out in/rescue Tony's/Clint's/Thor's homes? Very different circumstances each time."

Oh man, Bruce Banner and homes.

Bruce is a quiet and thoughtful guest who can seamlessly fake "making himself at home" to put his host at ease. The true test of this is Clint's, so vulnerable it's hidden for safety, so warm and comfortable it makes his skin crawl. He does not belong, cannot belong. The way Laura Barton reads him with those eyes, like he's a familiar bittersweet book with a happy ending he doesn't know about yet...well it's sweet of her, Clint's a lucky man, but it only makes it worse.

Bruce only means to visit the research labs, to be polite in the face of the man's enthusiasm, but he ends up staying because he underestimates how observant Tony is about people he cares about. Tony doesn't hide how much he studies Bruce, out of some reckless fascination or curiosity Bruce assumes. From the moment the elevator doors open, Tony tweaks and adjusts and revamps and refines. The environment conforms to Bruce like custom-fit armor. From mission to mission, the team coalesces around them as well. One day on the way back to his suite, after a long contentious shift with Tony in the lab and a companionable dinner with the rest of the team after, he stops cold, struck with the cozy feeling that he was heading home.

Bruce had coffee with Jane once, after she broke up with Thor, and ended up buying her a meal too as she kept talking and talking about Asgard. Poor Thor, how could he possibly compete with the wonders of the universe wielded by his people? It seemed to never occur to her that it was a package deal; or maybe it did, and she'd rather be a lay scientist than a queen resenting her political duties. Jane couldn't help Thor help his people. but Bruce can. The fact that, of any of the homes he's been invited into, this is the first he cannot break, that's just icing. It breaks anyway, but that still doesn't stop Bruce from fighting for it.

Comments

[nanslice]

Oh wow, the piece about Clint's home is so beautiful and heartbreaking.

And I absolutely love the last sentence in Thor's, gosh.

[feldman]

I imagine that kid-Bruce didn't go to many sleepovers, partially because he wasn't invited, but also because being in the midst of an average functional family dynamic was so painfully fraught.

[lunabee34]

Awww.

Love these.

[feldman]

Thank you! This started out as meta but those always turn into narrative for me.

[kernezelda]

Making oneself at home in a stranger's or even friend's home has never been easy for me,either; I've had to learn how to fake it, too. Bruce, having to adapt so many times to different locations, languages, levels of comfort and security, would have learned this earlier than I did, but I feel like we both are the wallflower types, observing with caution before attempting to participate, and always being visibly apart even in a crowd.

Tony's labs and close observation would have been more familiar to Bruce, but it's not the hostile or avid regard of Ross; it's professional curiosity, fellow-feeling--if it's comics canon that Tony designed Bruce's expandable trousers, it's friendship and even kinship. Bruce is not a freak to Tony; but if he is, then he's the same kind; intelligent beyond most, isolated by external circumstances and past choices, and by self-protection, kind because cruelty is easy but double-edged, hurting with every harming word or deed.

Bruce can go it alone, but he needs his humanity, the connections of human beings, to have a reason to come back. How easy would it be to retreat permanently behind the Hulk's powerful persona? One can go with Shakespeare: to "end the heartache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation devoutly to be wish'd." Or as Jimmy Finnegan might have put it, "Sleep sweet,[Brucie] boy. Sleep as long as you like. Sleep forever, [Bruce], baby. Forever and forever."

Thor's ploys are transparent. He wants what he wants, and will cajole or scold as needed to accomplish it. He's young for his people, but has seen so much compared to any human; as a scientist, Bruce should be fascinated. As a man flung from a cliff to awaken naked in a wrecked ship on an alien world, discovering that he's lost years and choice and love by others', by his lover's hands--he recognizes manipulation and lies and desperation because he's seen it all before. He has done it all before, and lets that snapping turtle out.

Thor doesn't want Bruce, he wants the Brute. And lies about it, poorly. But Bruce has nowhere else to go. If nothing else, getting off this actual alien wastehole goes in tandem with helping Thor; it's a two-for-one practical deal. It's stressful as hell, but he's not scared of death; that's forbidden to him. So escape Hulk's terrible world, fly through a scientific marvel, throw himself into the fight. If that's his exit strategy, fine. He's gotta get home somehow.