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[Annabeth's face pops up, curls a mess as usual, but considering the turtle developments, she doesn't look nearly as cross as usual?? There's the sounds of water splashing around somewhere in the suite, but she doesn't appear to care.]

It goes without saying that the turtle's health started improving at last. [Because powers! And it's swimming again!] I know various numbers of us were tasked by Evandau into investigations, and I don't know how all the other situations turned out, but Doctor Soranik Natu, Rogue, Percy Jackson, and myself found something probably worth sharing.

We were assigned with investigating a string of robberies initially, but really, the important part is we discovered a series of incomplete archways in several different homes and attempted to recreate one in its entirety.

The whole "world between Life, Death, and Dreaming" thing everyone gets on arrival? Start taking it literally, if you weren't before. Keeliai as we live in it here is the Life plane. The archway opened up a portal of a kind, and said portal took us to the Death plane.

[A blob of water floats across the screen, blurring Annabeth's face, but it's still possible to see her turn around in a huff, and from somewhere off screen there's an "Oops, sorry!" before the water flies off. She continues unperturbed.]

It was basically a version of Keeliai gone awry and ruined, everything rotting away, and we found markings in the form of some kind of blood magic, directly over where the Emperor's Palace is in this plane. Scans proved it to be kedan blood in origin, some of it fresh, and the pattern was being drawn by - you know, what we're here to fight, in a magical attempt to kill Tu Vishan. We were able to wipe the incomplete blood slate clean and stop this part of his illness before leaving the plane. [By 'we' she mostly means Ocean Jesus did A Water Thing.]

Unfortunately, or fortunately, the way in seems to be gone. The archways all disappeared once we got back, as did that particular methodology in creating them. [Melted pins ahh. A pause.] The Death plane is probably where our infamous threat is hiding. Its domain, so to speak.

Tu Vishan's health is picking up, but this - this situation here, with this thing we're up against? It's definitely not over.

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Come in any time. [It's an open offer extending to more than just explaining the PSDs.]

[Seeing that hint of a grin merits her an exasperated edge of a smile.] No. Not... really. Apparently there's, I don't know, Asgardians in my future. I haven't met them yet, at home.

[Bruce isn't about to press. The Archive probably heard all of this, anyway. She'll make herself known if she wants to.] Alright.

To your lab, you mean? [She does pick up on that extended offer, though.]

[Annabeth tries not to look pleased with herself for getting a reaction.] We have the gods back home, but science still applies, too. They can mix together or avoid each other entirely, depending. Asgardians, huh? [She has minimal Norse knowledge.] Good luck with that.

[She is curious. Curious enough that if she doesn't find this Archive on her own, she may very well approach Bruce for an introduction. Information, man!!]

Uh... yeah. [As a light joke,] You could go to my apartment, but I'm hardly ever there.

Well, they're not really-- gods. I think they're aliens that we call gods. No one's really explained it. [Wryly poking fun, still with that slight smile.] So I don't have a lot to look forward to on the science/magic front at home, either.

[She also lurks around his lab a lot if Annabeth wants to just run into her... just saying.]

[Was that a joke. Her lip quirks.] Just double checking.

[Aliens. Well ok.] Well, they've got to have some connection or basis in the myths, right? Or you wouldn't call them Asgardian. That could tell you a little bit, though they're still probably not what you'd expect exactly.

[Oh well how convenient!!]

[He's trying, okay? He needs practice.]

Loki used to be here. We met. [It's a short statement, and it's not hard to guess from his tone that it wasn't a pleasant meeting.] Trickster, lies, magic. I'd say it's not far off.

[There's a brief moment's hesitation, but there's no reason not to tell her, so he adds,] I guess I'm on a team with Thor in the future? Who thought I was-- good for teamwork, no one's explained either.

[She considers that for a moment.] Well, you're smart. [Understatement, but it still applies.] Every team benefits from intelligence. [She might also be biased, but it is super true okok.]

[Then there's that awkward moment where he realizes that Annabeth still doesn't know the main reason he doesn't work as a team player. His disinclination to work with others is part of it, but piddling compared to the Hulk.]

My intelligence I don't mind... contributing. [This is one of the very few times he openly acknowledges how smart he is, and even now it's a passing mention.] But I, uh-- there's another reason. What we talked about when we first met.

[He's even more reluctant to talk about it now than he had been at the time. He'd needed the information, but Bruce hates that he'd been that open with her, even if she'd lived up to it.]

[Annabeth picks up on it right away. Of course she does. She's made the connection with whatever he meant in the first conversation and whatever inescapable thing he spoke with to her and Percy when Tartarus came up.]

[And she is Annabeth Chase, so of course she's been wondering. She can't figure it out, either. She just hasn't really had the opportunity to ask, and she never really wanted to ask out of the blue. It felt like an invasion of privacy, and Bruce respects hers so she does the same.]

[The question is on the tip of her tongue, but she hesitates again. There's no hiding the curiousness on her face, but she's still cautious at the same time. She wants to know, but her tone still implies he doesn't have to answer.] What is it, exactly? This problem of yours?

[At first, he genuinely hadn't wanted her to know. Bruce had taken several weeks to come out of his delusion that he could keep the Hulk secret here. He was used to it being his own, private problem-- massive and overtaking his life, but his, and involving anyone else was endangering them. The entire paradigm shift he'd undergone here to coming to understand that he could be open about it if he so desired had taken him time. He still doesn't want to sing it from the mountain tops, or spread the information unnecessarily, although anyone industrious enough to look through the network could find all the pieces to put together.

But someone he trusts in some measure, and genuinely likes, like Annabeth-- Bruce doesn't see why he shouldn't tell her. He just doesn't have a lot of experience with doing it, not without some external crisis compelling him.

He shifts, uncomfortable, and hedges with,] You were here for the... ghost invasion. Did you see a, uh, a big green thing, really angry? [That simple description was more than adequate to describe the Hulk to someone that had actually seen him. If she had, it would be a nice conversational shortcut, but Bruce hopes she hadn't.]

I did see it, yeah. [Not that everyone would have, but stumbling anywhere near it translated most definitely into hard to miss.]

[It's not entirely a hard conclusion to reach if you have glimpses of the wider picture, and Annabeth reaches it quickly. Her face only flashes in thought for a moment, before lighting up with realization. She pauses for a moment before speaking, remembering Bruce's penchant for privacy, and slams up Leo's stronger encryption, just in case.]

That was you? [She doesn't sound particularly afraid or shocked or anything of the sort, and though part of it is because she can tell he's uncomfortable, the other part is just genuine lack of any of it. She mulls over what she's learned from him about it in the past, and it lines up pretty easily. Right now it's mostly curiosity and concern.]

Edited 2013-08-05 08:42 (UTC)

[He appreciates the stronger encryption, although the cat's out of the bag by now. Too many people have recognized him just from his name, in public on the network. But Bruce likes Annabeth for a reason, and this is one of those reasons-- her consideration for his privacy, and how fast she makes the realization.]

That's the million dollar question, [he says wryly. But a second later he explains more straight forwardly.] I don't know how much that's me. But I turn into that. Him. [Don't pay any mind to that pronoun slip.]

Everyone else uses 'the Hulk'. [His distaste for the term is evident, but he repeats it for her so prevent confusion.]

[Annabeth can grasp there's a level of trust and weight in the revelation, but her brain's already running over previous conversations on the subject, poking at what she remembers.]

Your ability you can't control. Your impossible situation. [She thinks over all he's told her in the past, trying to piece together as much as she can to avoid making him explain more than necessary. He's still uncomfortable, and she doesn't want to push too much. Still, she's always been bad at containing curiosity.] Did you do it to yourself? [Her tone implies she's not asking for detail, just confirmation. He'd called it a mutation. And he's smart, which puts it in the realm of possibility.]

[She picks up on that distaste.] What do you call it? [Because she won't use something he doesn't like X(]

[He's fully expecting her to put the pieces together relatively quickly, but that question startles a flash of an embittered smirk, before it fades and his eyes slide away from the screen.] Yeah. Hubris.

[The origins of what he'd done to himself, and how responsible he feels, aren't something Bruce wants to get into. He admits enough with that bare word, he thinks; especially given her other question, which is something no one else has thought to ask him. They all make their own assumptions, pick their own name, and even when it's Bruce directed at that other half of him, he doesn't like that any better than Hulk.

He takes a silent breath and lets it out, eyes drifting back to meet hers through the camera.] The monster. [It's a stark, sober admission.] For a long time-- mostly it. Recently graduated to he.

[And that's all. No names, nothing humanizing, and barely a pronoun that granted sentience. Certainly nothing that would imply the Hulk's relative connection to Bruce, or how much they were one and the same, or separate.]

[Her face darkens over the word hubris as soon as he says it. He doesn't need to say much more. She doesn't need to know much more. Annabeth understands more than he realizes, and she can't help the flash of taunting Arachne. Of the spinnerets. Of the floor collapsing beneath her. She hopes Percy's not listening or watching too carefully.]

[Tartarus looms. Her fault. Her hubris. She shoves it away, focusing back on Bruce. There's a silent but strong understanding in her expression, something deeper than he might be expecting. Experience with it of her own.]

[But she doesn't say anything, doesn't address it beyond the quiet commiseration.]

Which one should I use? Him? [He, it, monster - she doesn't like the idea of using monster; it brings up her negative connotations, and she doesn't really want to apply them to Bruce, regardless of what he turns into.]

Edited 2013-08-06 09:07 (UTC)

[It is much deeper than he was expecting, and the understanding is something he'd never hope to see reflected on her face. Bruce has come to learn that there is far more to her life, and Percy's, than he'd first realized-- more complications, more sadness, and more loss. It makes it easy for him to treat them with as much even-handed respect as he has, when loss is the thing Bruce respects most, having underwent so much of it himself.

He doesn't need to speak on it to see that flash of commiseration, leaves it unaddressed with more than a beat of silence. But maybe it makes him more honest than he needs to be, or usually is, on the subject of what to call his other half.

Any element of humor, dark or bitter or self-mocking, leaves him, and he measures out his words with more weight than a simple pronoun choice is due.] Him. He's... he can speak if he wants to. Usually he doesn't want to. But he has some sentience.

I just didn't want to admit that. I don't remember anything that he does. It's mostly blank. And it's not like we-- talk. [There's a slight scoff on the last word, belying Bruce's incredulity at the idea.]

[It doesn't quite hit her right away, the flash of understanding between them - not in the way she realizes. But it's a connection between them, one she hasn't really had with too many people. Hubris was a common flaw in children of Athena, but none of her siblings alive right now experienced it the way she has. None of them have fallen into Tartarus because of it.]

[Annabeth nods, every word carefully filed and listened to accordingly. She already knows he can't control it; she doesn't know what triggers it, but she's a little hesitant to ask.] Is he strong enough to throw more than chunks of rock? [Or you know, vehicles.]

[It's definitely a different story when your hubris alters your entire life irrevocably. Bruce wouldn't refute the comparison of what his life had become after the Hulk to something like hell. Forced to be alone, unable to tell anyone so much as his name truthfully, constantly on the run and destitute, sometimes without enough money even to eat-- for nine years of that, to say nothing of the flashbacks and sheer horror at the loss of control of his own body. And the guilt, at knowing what he'd done, and is unable to stop himself from doing.

The downfall of hubris is a lot farther down for them.

But this kind of question he doesn't mind, and Bruce tries to keep things from being too deathly serious by letting a dry tone enter his voice.] He's torn tanks apart with his bare hands. A significant subset of the U.S. military hasn't been able to take him down. The most they can do is tranq me before I change.

Whatever the upper limit is, I haven't found it.

[She'd been thinking about it lately, her hubris, on and off, and bringing it up in the current conversation will probably push it towards a more constant on. But she's not thinking about that right now, getting caught up in the subject at hand.]

[Which she listens to carefully, keeping her expression fairly neutral over it all.] That's why you seriously considered living on the mainland. It would keep him from appearing, right?

[A short exhale.] Right. And why the... when we had that festival, and everyone was calm-- and during depowering-- [His eyes skitter away.] Closest thing to a vacation I've had in almost ten years.

[But that's a little too overtly self-pitying for Bruce to let it stand on its own. He looks back at her again to say,] You're taking this pretty calmly. [It's a slight question couched in an observation.]

There's... not a lot that can really surprise me anymore. [Because demigods. And maybe for a moment, she thinks about Kronos using Luke as a host. It's not similar, not really, but she can't help it. She smiles a little wryly.] Even if I wasn't living on the back of a giant turtle.

[Besides, panicking or being super alarmed over the revelation feels wrong. Not that she had the urge for either.]

Edited 2013-08-13 08:24 (UTC)

Yeah. I'm just not, used to being able to explain it.

[Bruce runs a hand briefly over his face.] It would've endangered someone at home to know that much. It's still weird that that's-- not true here. [Nine years of habit was hard to break.]

[She shrugs a little, but in a kind of understanding rather than being dismissive.] I spent my first six months here keeping the whole demigod thing under wraps, and we definitely don't talk about it to people back home who don't already know.

I guess there's not really a lot to lose here. Or at least, not as many consequences over not keeping things secret. It can still be weird, though.

Edited 2013-08-14 04:14 (UTC)

I didn't realize... that was a secret.

I keep having people recognize me. Or not me, but they know enough. [With an undeniable note of bitter sarcasm,] Hearing about myself in other worlds turns out to not be that helpful.

Not anymore, here at least. Leo and Percy blabbed. But most mortals don't even believe in the gods anymore back home, so.

[She scrunches her face up. She's heard of the whole alternate universe thing, but fortunately, never experienced it herself.] That might make it more difficult to keep on the down low, yeah. Another you that someone already knows.

I can't call myself a believer, [he admits, with no trace of self-consciousness.] But things are a little different here.

It's been impossible. I'm sort of-- famous. In the future. And in other worlds. [His distaste for it is obvious.] I get a fan club.

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