AGAINST MY WILL 4 (CHAPTER) (Patreon)

FULL CHAPTER HERE —> AGAINST MY WILL 4

JULY 10
8 AM EST
THE TRISKELION

It just wasn’t fair.

“-ogers quarters were breached? Who do they think was stupid enough to even try, Bruce?” The seagull perched atop a junction box was loud in the early morning, the sound almost blending into the water around the Triskelion they stood on. Even still, Betty Ross managed to make herself heard above it all, voice strong as ever. “The Arabs, the Chinese, what?”

“Actually, Betty, he reckons it was just a bunch of kids.” Robert Bruce Banner held his head down, the excuse of his cufflinks enough to avoid looking the woman in the face as he answered her. “From what the man told me, he’s heading across the street to give them a spanking right now.”

“Kids?” Betty almost ground the word through her teeth, clenched as they were. “You’re telling me…” Both her hands went to her hips, the black pantsuit pulling the eyes toward the shape of them even as Bruce looked away again. “That he’s not showing up because of kids?”

“Y-yes, poor Cap.” Two fingers went to the bridge of his nose, glasses edged back up before they could slip any further. “Spent all last week trawling flea markets to piece together his old record collection and some little brats take some paint-stripper to them.”

“Well, golly gee whiz, Doctor Banner, how tragic that is to hear…” It certainly didn’t sound like it but you never knew with Betty anyway. “But right now, I’m a little more concerned about this televised training exercise nobody’s bothered showing up for.”

“Well, I mean…”

“Well, what?” Sharp brown eyes snapped his way, Betty’s short ponytail swishing behind her as she stared him down. “Spit it out.”

“Well…” It took the effort of ages to keep still, holding the gulp in his throat steady as he looked out toward the flashing cameras over by the hangars just a few dozen feet distant. “There’s Giant-Man.”

“Giant-Man?” Betty raised a hand, Bruce flinching and immediately regretting it as his girlfriend slapped at the air in the direction of the near sixty-foot man in the maroon suit. “As far as the media’s going to be concerned, our team might as well just be Giant-Man.”

That’s… He could only nod at that truth well aware that with Stark in space, Fury busy with Cheney all morning and Janet with Rogers avenging his albums, the team was rather scant when it came to actual members present. “That’s fair, I suppose.”

“‘That’s fair’, he says.” The voice was mocking and entirely unlike how he sounded but it still hurt all the same as Betty screwed up her face at him. “‘That’s fair.’”

“Wh-what, I was agreeing with you, Betty?”

“Of course you were.” That sneer she wore so easily didn’t fade even as she turned away from him again, Bruce could tell that much. Even when he closed his eyes, he could hear every emotion in her voice and all the… the feelings it sent through him.

Every part of him.

“My God, Bruce. Wasn’t it bad enough that Hank Pym had you demoted without you letting everybody down with the new Super-Soldiers too?”

“What…” It was bad enough. “What are you talking about, Betty? I’m not demoted anymore.”

“No, you are.” She scoffed with her back turned to him. “I don’t see you on the Super Soldier project anymore, do I? You should be losing your mind about failing to crack Cap’s serum.”

It’s not fair.

“...this is me losing my mind.”

The words slipped out quiet, his eyes closed as he said it, but Betty didn’t even seem to notice he’d said anything. Whether she wasn’t paying attention or outright ignoring him, neither would be anything new but both options still put a spike of pain in his chest.

“Oh, get over yourself.” Apparently, she had heard him, a single finger raised as she turned back on him with a glare. “The hacks are going to eat us alive for this, you moron. I thought being smart was the one thing you could actually do?”

“I—” Bruce’s mouth hung open, wind blowing his hair over his forehead. “I’m sorry…”

“All you are is sorry. And sorry doesn’t stop me looking like an idiot, now does it?” Her hands went up as Betty finally walked away, leaving Bruce behind as she made her way over to the media circus around Giant-Man, reporters begging him to lift a jet. “Just make sure Fury gets Thor on the team tonight or this temporary break becomes permanent.”

FULL CHAPTER HERE —> AGAINST MY WILL 4