sixthiterationlogs | Hello Darkness My Old Friend

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Hello Darkness My Old Friend

WHO: Bruce Banner
WHERE: South Village Fountain
WHEN: 9/17
OPEN TO: Open to all!
WARNINGS: None yet

BUNKER/SOUTH VILLAGE FOUNTAIN

In the tube, Banner was unconscious. Nothing so restful as a simple dream, that would be too kind, instead his mind was restless. It was a waking nightmare, seeing people turn to dust before his eyes, seeing the looks of pain and loss on the few people in the world he still cared about, and the friend he knew best was missing, gone, who knows where. Everything was wrong. And now he was here. His hair was newly short and gray, his figure average and unassuming, and he woke up suddenly to propulsion that he couldn't possibly be ready for.

This wasn't really the first time he woke up somewhere he shouldn't be, in a place he couldn't remember; this was a common situation. It wasn't even the first time he was in the water, struggling to breathe, his limbs wildly flailing. But it was a rare occurrence that this moment of concern didn't follow with the feeling to the tip of his toes of the other presence waiting. Then again, he and the Hulk had issues. Issues not even close to being addressed. It meant he was vulnerable. It meant many things. Banner finally got himself together and swam up, figuring out which way was up, and broke the surface gasping. To where? To here. Where was here?

Exhausted and with a heavy heart, he sat on the edge of the fountain and breathed deeply, running hands through his wet hair. Nothing seemed familiar around there, but hey, it wasn't a planet geared toward trying to kill him or freak him out. So far. Don't jinx it, Banner. He sat there for a long time, he had no idea how long. He was in no hurry to move. The world was too much right then, and whatever this was, it was a few steps above.

The strangest part of everything was the clothing. The extras. Normally he woke up naked. So there was that one small good thing. It took him awhile before he was up and walking, but eventually it happened.

INN

At first he simply walked around. Nothing was familiar. In fact, he was fairly certain it seemed dissimilar from anything he'd known before. Some things were the same, yes, but Banner couldn't see how the Hulk brought him this far. And he was wearing clothes. What the hell was happening now? Was this another trick from Thanos? That made sense. He clearly liked to torture people. When he saw the inn, he paused. He tried to avoid people most of the time. It was too dangerous, he was too dangerous, except now he wasn't at all and that meant people he walked into could in fact be dangerous to him. He tried to reach out to see if the Hulk was still ignoring him.

There was nothing. No touch. No moment of anger or denial. No feeling whatsoever. Nothing. He was the only on home. At first he couldn't figure out what that meant. All these years later, how could it be? All the years trying to get here, and it just happened when he woke up. Stunned and overwhelmed, he could only stumble over to the outside wall of the Inn and lean against it. Not going in, just hovering there, and then he started to crumble down until he was sitting on the ground, staring off into space.

What was he feeling? Relief? Loss? Fear? Confusion? All of it.

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Wanda had a very strange relationship with many of the Avengers. Bruce was someone who she had never had the chance to get to know as a friend because he had disappeared after Ultron's defeat. She remembered Natasha trying to find him, demanding Tony for information about the craft so she could locate Bruce but it all came to nothing. There were stories about him and she's seen the depth to his anger but that wasn't the same as knowing him.

It surprised her that he was so readily to accept her again. She understood with Natasha and Clint. They all had done horrible things in their past and were trying to atone. Steve was hopelessly optimistic, Vision was young and everyone else was following orders. Wanda and Tony tolerated each other and helped each other but it was a business arrangement, it wasn't about being friends or teammates.

Wanda didn't really know how things with Bruce were going to go.

Dressed in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, Wanda sat at one of the tables in the inn. It was in the far back corner but within view of the door. He already knew what she looked like so she trusted Bruce to find her when he was ready to talk. She had some stew in front of her but she wasn't eating it. It's been years since Ultron and her brother's death as well as another year or so of her being trapped in this place. She didn't look like the child Bruce had first seen; now she looked like a solider, weathered by her past but tempered by newer experiences.

For Bruce, the Avengers were a symbol of hope and pain. He believed in them, that was where it went wrong, or rather he believed in himself with them. They accepted his darker side and helped him find a way to transform back. They gave him soothing music and took time to reassure him that he was wanted. Those acts of kindness, he couldn't express to them what it did. Yes, he was closer to some than others. He and Tony were fused at the hip during that time, he and Nat were complicated. But Steve, Clint, Thor, they were there for him too.

Redemption was a consistent part of the team. They were all looking for it, in one way or another. He thought that Steve might be the only one above it, when it came down to it. He struggled in his own sense, yes, but he was still the cleanest of them all, a good man saving the world. But the rest of them? Lived with their bad decisions as best as they could. With his death toll on his back, Bruce was the last person to be cruel to another. It wasn't in his DNA, before the Hulk and after.

So yes, it was easy to forgive Wanda, who he barely knew. She was so damn young. She looked older now, and when he saw her during Thanos, but she was still young. She made a decision, and she did pay for it, in her brother's life, taken too soon. She put the hallucinations in his head and the Hulk destroyed and killed like he was meant to do, but all bad acts came from somewhere. Her pain in this case.

Bruce spotted her immediately and walked over, noting the differences and the similarities in her. He remembered what she did, in the end, something so difficult and it was devastating to watch. He might have walked away from the people he loved most in the world, but he also was never asked to destroy them. Wanda had that in her, that strength. He sat down across from her and smiled, as true a smile as he was capable of. "Thanks for meeting me."

Wanda wasn't sure how this meeting would go. Yes, he had agreed to meet her but she imagined a similar situation to her awkward conversation with Tony a few days before. The best she could do was try and help Bruce now. There was no changing the past. She would always be trying to make up for her past mistakes but what's done was done.

"I should be saying that to you." Her accent was still thick and warm as she met Bruce's tight smile with her own. "It's easier to explain things like this." Though Wanda didn't have all the answers, she's been living in this village for awhile.

"We should probably start with any specific questions you have." Wanda had no doubt that he'd have a lot of them and some of his questions might be about her and her affiliation with the Avengers. "About this place or anything else."

Bruce was gone by the time Wanda joined the team, so he never got the chance to accept her apologies and attempt to start again. He understood people who sought redemption. The blood on his own hands would never go away, and he was not capable of blaming others for their past deeds. Not if they were trying to change. Someone like Thaddeus Ross, he would always hate and never trust, but that was because the man only got worse with time. Wanda was young. She was misled.

"It's okay. I don't hold grudges." He wanted her to understand that up front, and hoped the genuine understated warmth would prove it. She'd been a true Avenger when he saw her last. She fought hard for them. She'd put the time in, he knew that much. "Text is easier, but context is lost on it." It was typically more comfortable for him, to have that space in between, but he would live with it.

"No, I, uh, got some answers about our situation back home. I came back to earth after a few years." So as far as he was concerned, that was wrapped up. Unless Wanda wanted to talk about anything. He was definitely not going to offer her the misery of knowing what came next. "I suppose if you want to explain what's happened here since you arrived and what you think the key parts to know about are in this place. Cliff notes, if it's easier than going into detail."

Wanda nodded her head and exhaled a soft breath of relief. She had already known that Bruce was willing to speak with her, that was why they had met, but hearing him both acknowledge their shared past and move on was a comfort. It felt like they had a chance to actually move on from it.

"Cliff notes." She had to figure out what those would be. "To start, everyone arrives here with different memories. The last I remember was helping Steve but you hadn't returned yet. This place..." Her lips pressed into a thin line. "It's somehow outside of our universe. Thor was trapped here for a while as well but he left months before I did." She left and returned. That was another long story where she only new the beginning and end.

"This place and our captors are testing us though I don't know why."

There was so much she wanted to try and explain but she was trying to keep things brief. It was hard to believe that so much had happened.

Bruce was usually the one holding his breath in tense situations, so knowing that Wanda could relax now was gratifying. It wasn't like he wanted to rehash the fact he created Ultron in the first place, so there were apologies to go around, and instead they could skip past them. This was definitely not a place that he felt people should hold onto the past in. He hoped eventually Tony would see that regarding Steve, because this was a crisis, and if things were bad, they had to count on each other. They did it for Thanos, and they could do it here too. Hopefully.

Thor was here and gone. He was sorry to hear that. They'd come to rely on each other a little after their experience together. At least he knew for sure he was alive. "People have theorized about the multiverse existing almost as long as we've been theorizing about existence." Ancient times there were questions about what was reality and what if realty was not what it seemed. It grew sophisticated with time, but at its core, it was the same theory. "Not just different planets in a galaxy, different realities, different versions of the same timelines. I just saw you, but it was years later than what you remember, you've been here and life continued on while you were gone."

He loved the concept of a multiverse when he was younger, but now it was alarming. "The problem is that since it's all been theory, there's no knowledge on how to stop it. Reverse it. Get out of it." And whoever kept them there had reasons for doing it. Bruce glanced her way, running a hand over his face. "What kinds of things happen here that qualify as testing?"

Wanda nodded her head. It wasn't the first time she's heard this theory though she didn't know how much validity it had. Usually the simplest explanation was the right one and in terms of physics, people being pulled from multiple realities wasn't the simplest. That would take a lot of energy and someone would have noticed.

"Okay but it's like those realities are paused. People return home like they've never left and then reappear in the fountain or they have dreams of memories in their sleep." The later was what happened to Wanda. "That theory doesn't completely explain that."

Her lips pressed into a thin line. "Also people from different worlds that are so different from ours." Wanda had spent a lot of time thinking about this. "We started in a simulation. There were glitches and a canyon wall around the whole area. We came through the fountain and time had passed..." Wanda had to cut her hair. "Then we were here. People come and go from different times or with different memories but some people disappear and then reappear like I did or they have memories of their world like they were there but they weren't."

She was trying to remember too many things at ones.

"It's all theory, so I couldn't say for certain, but the multiverse can exist with all of these facts. The idea is that there's a parallel universe for every possible change, so there could be a world where you were taken away to here and no one ever saw you again. Just as a version of you stayed on earth in mine could exist at the same time. There's an infinite amount of possibilities." Bruce knew a great deal about string theory and the branches and connections it went to, so the multiverse was somewhere on his broad spectrum of interests.

"Sorry, honestly even if all of this is true, theorizing doesn't help us with the reality." There were no solutions within the multiverse that he was aware of that could transport them from one place to another. Or was there? Hm. Thoughts for another day. "What's happening to us right now is what matters." He listened to her and tapped a finger on his chin, stewing in it for a moment. "You were in a simulation but now the simulation is real." Or is it? It could be a simulation inside of a simulation. He had to stop before he fried his brain too quickly.

"This is definitely an experiment of some kind, it checks off most things required for an objective scientific study. A blend of hands off, we never see them, with hands on, they cause things to happen." The they was the question mark.

"It doesn't help, we have a lot of theories but no way to prove them." A lot of this was outside of what Wanda understood but she knew that it was possible. Anything was possible in this place.

Her finger slowly ran along the grain of the wooden table as her thoughts tumbled and twisted in incongruent paths. She wasn't sure what else to tell him. There was a lot of information but none of it was pleasant and most of what Wanda knew only raised more questions. Bruce was likely to figure it out but she needed to give him information that helped. The only problem was that she didn't know if this place was different from the simulation. The rules could have changed.

"It is. They've altered peoples memories, physical traits and put us through harsh weather conditions." That was a good sum up. "I don't know what most of it means."

"No way to prove them yet. You never know. Sometimes things add up later on. They could slip up eventually." Bruce wasn't inherently optimistic. He was the opposite. But he knew first hand that scientists were fallible. Whoever was in charge did have greater powers, yes, but they were still manipulating life forms for some kind of reasons. Which meant they were sentient, which meant they were fallible. "Or not. Either way, it's good to try and keep on top of what details or theories we have as we go."

He needed two dozen notebooks. And a chalkboard. Also a computer, but the other two seemed more likely.

"I don't either, yet, but we'll put our heads together and think of something. At the least we can focus on what happens each time, and get ready for it. What kind of weather conditions are we talking about?" Because that was a task that wasn't so difficult to focus on. Terrible weather meant that the shelters had to be fortified and supplies had to be counted and stored in case of something new happening.

"I have some notes. Added to what's here..." She nodded towards the bulletin board that held peoples accounts as well as skills and other notes. "You might be able to uncover more than we could." The bulletin board wasn't perfect but it was the best way they had to pass along information. It was in the one place that everyone eventually ended up and it was a clear fixture on the wall.

"Paper is in short supply but if you have a room, you can write on the walls and other surfaces." It'd do better than trying to find that much paper.

She swallowed again and wondered if there was anything to drink prepared in the kitchen. "People struck by lighting. More than what's natural. Snow storms and floods."

Bruce hadn't gotten a great look at it before, but now that he had context about why it was there, he stood up. He didn't mean to be rude while they were still talking, but he did have a habit of letting his mind take him places. It wasn't far away, after all, and he could still hear her clear as a bell. He ran his fingers over the board, taking a few mental notes as he went. He was always looking for patterns and connections, because it created a kind of logic that was necessary to come to conclusions.

"Snow storms and floods. Varied weather. It could be natural to the planet we're on, but considering the testing happening, I'm guessing it's more intentional." Pushing buttons and seeing what happens. "Do we have defenses strong enough to prepare for whatever comes next?" Bruce glanced over to her, almost snapping out of his strange trance, blushing instantly. "Oh, I'm ... I'm sorry. It wasn't polite." This wasn't exactly new behavior of his, but she joined the Avengers after he was gone. "Tony and I tend to walk and talk." They were apparently very funny to watch in the lab sometimes, when they didn't realize anyone was watching.

Wanda didn't mind Bruce's sudden exit. She watched him move over to the bulletin board and look over the information that was left there. It was a lot of different things: floods, blizzards, heat waves, the sudden appearance of power, lightening attacks. It was too much for one board but a lot of it was up there in one way or another.

After a moment she rose and followed behind him.

"I don't know of a place in the world that has weather that varies this much." They not only had all four seasons but extreme situations that are usually particular to one area. "Not really. A lot of times we can only react. There was an attack on the inn a few months ago. I don't know how long the repairs took but I think there are still some places that need work." She hadn't been around then and didn't know all of the details.

"You're fine Bruce." Wanda flashed him a light smile.

Bruce relaxed at her assurance and smiled back, tapping his fingers on a few specific words as if they would give him the answers if he stared at them long enough. "We're going to need another board. And more notes. This is a good general stash, but all the details can't fit." And the details could very well be where some of the secrets were. Or not. It was hard to tell, his brain was very full. He just saw a lot of people die, so it wasn't firing at its highest capacity.

"We're going to need to prioritize repairs and defenses. Whatever we do though, my guess is they'll test it in some way. If we built high walls, they'd either knock them down or get around them. It still means we need them." Because whether or not it was a test, it was lives on the line. Maybe. He was tired. Bruce rubbed at his eyes, they were a little bloodshot, but it'd been a day. Looking at her was a reminder he saw her die not too long ago. "Is there, um, a community leader? Sort of like Cap, but for this area."

"We don't have the materials for that." It was a sad but simple fact. "You might find a blank journal if you're lucky but a lot of the materials were taken and used. This is what we could fit over time. Paper is a little easier to run into now than it used to be but its still a valuable resource." They didn't pretty good with what they had.

"Again, materials. Take a look at what's here Bruce. Unless you know how to split wood and turn them into battlements without any extra abilities, it's not going to be a good use of our energy. Winter is coming and we'll have to store enough food for everyone." There were a lot of people in the village.

Wanda shook her head. "Not enough people get along but there are different smaller groups. Kate more or less helps run the inn and makes sure that everyone is feed. Mark handles the gardening. There is a list of people and their skills here. This board is really the only way we have to communicate with each other."

"I understand, in these situations resources are always the problem, but people here seem more competent than most. I lived in third world countries for awhile where people had much less." There weren't experiment, there weren't wild weather patterns, but there was war and famine and starvation. Bruce finagled some things while he was there. It wasn't enough. It never would be. "I do have a photographic memory so I can use that a little, and humans used to only have oral histories to go off of anyway.

"Gathering food and blankets will be priority. This could start picking us off one by one." He had people to worry about now. They could take care of themselves, yes, but he already spoke to teenagers. Kids. Formerly super powered kids, but they had to come first. "Do you think people are holding back from getting together more because they really have nothing in common, or there's just a lack of communication?"

Wanda smiled. "Food and blankets are here. A lot has already been done and it'd be good to take a look around. There is a whole store room of things that people borrow and return when needed." The cynic in Wanda found the system at the inn amazing. "Consumables aren't there, paper and things like that but we have lunch here every day. I try and help preserve food too."

She pointed towards another paper on the board. "This is a list of everyone's talents and things that they're willing to teach others. There is fishing, hunting and so on." There was a lot of communication going on between people but you had to know where to look.

"There was someone making paper he before. That's where most of this came from but he's gone and I don't think anyone else knows the process."

Bruce loved information dumps. It's a lot, but it will all sort itself out in his head eventually. He could really use something to take notes on himself, because the way he frames information in his head is not the same as everyone else. But that's simply not doable at the moment. He nodded as he listened to her, feeling like his brain was on fire, but at least there's some kind of order. It's a start. "Thanks. I'll probably be able to process this all better when I process ... everything else that just happened." Okay, so, never, but at least part of the way.

He glanced over at her, turning to face her. "Outside of those things, how are you? How are the people here? Are they able to keep their spirits up? Are you?" It wasn't always the obvious route, worrying about how people are feeling as well as thinking, but in this situation it is kind of relevant. They could have all the plans in the world and unravel at the seams. The Avengers were very organized and still unraveled at the seams.

Wanda smiled; her expression soft and understanding. "Take your time." It was a lot to take in and even someone like Bruce, who's seen the oddities of the world, should take the time to let the situation settle before diving into sorting it out. "We have a lot of time here." It was one of the few things they did have.

"Me?" She blinked. That wasn't a question that Wanda was used too. "I am as good as I can be. I'm sure that most people will say the same. Some take the situation well and others don't. All the people who arrive here seem to be resilient in some way." It was a lot and people reacted to stress differently.

"How are you holding up with all this?"

"They probably don't want to bring people here who break easily." It wouldn't tell them much about their subjects after it was done. Bruce gave her a small smile. There were many things about the Avengers, but easily breakable was not one of them. At least not individually. As a group? A whole different thing, apparently.

"Honestly, I'm not sure. I just went through ... a lot." Bruce took in a deep breath and let it out. He doesn't plan on cluing her into their tragic future unless she wants to know. It's too much. He witnessed people turn into dust before his eyes, with no knowledge of where Tony was, at the time. It was devastating. It's completely taken over his mind, so the rest of this? Might very well have to wait in line. "Honestly what's going on here is nothing comparatively. Which sounds crazy I know."

"Probably not." She agreed with a silent nod of her head. The overseers were testing them and it wouldn't help to have weak test subjects.

Wanda's lips tugged into a frown as Bruce spoke. "Clint mentioned something bad happened. I don't want to know Bruce but I'm here if you need someone." She'd be honest with him. She really didn't want to know her future but Bruce was an Avengers and someone who Wanda naturally wanted to look out for.

"Don't worry, Wanda, I won't tell you anything you don't want to know." And he meant that. For her, it was not worth it, not even a little. There was nothing that would be gained by her knowing the truth. "Thank you. I'm here for you too."

[ooc: can wrap there?]

[ooc: that's a wrap!]

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Hello Darkness My Old Friend

INN - After Text Conversation - Around Sept 18th

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