Marvel Reborn: Gems Of Infinite Potential

"Bug Ward sales are significantly exceeding projections, and as a result, our quarterly profit margin was ten percent over projections for last quarter," announced Frank Scheef, the CEO of Pym Technologies, as he finished his briefing.

I gave a nod. "More money is always nice, but work with Tyler," the Raith Industries VP of Information, and the man who was ultimately responsible for all of our projections, "to figure out why the projections were off. That big a variance means something was overlooked." The two men gave their own nods of acceptance, and I turned to one of the women present, "Michelle, how are the controllable bees coming?"

Raith Industries' Head of BioScience, at least for everything that wasn't kept fully black, shrugged slightly. "We are still running into some problems trying to modify their DNA to produce nervous systems susceptible to the EMP communication device. It's mostly just a matter of testing various simulated models until we find the right answer, another six months maybe, but that's mostly just an educated guess. The real problem is going to be the regulatory approval when we start trying to produce the live bugs, and Maddox is who you should be asking about that."

I turned to the Raith Industries' General Counsel at that and raised an eyebrow.

"I'm working through the process, but we are talking about creating a new, self-replicating, genetically-engineered species. If this was a military project, then it wouldn't be too bad, we could get the approval through DoD and their various exemptions and immunities. But you wanted to keep this away from the military contracts, and that means dealing with much more stringent standards. Honestly, I'm not sure if we can manage to make it legal under current law. I'm waiting on various formal opinions from the relevant agencies. My inclination though is that we are going to have to get the law changed."

I winced at that. Changing laws wasn't so much difficult as it was time-consuming, expensive, and risky. "Get started planning for that. At least, in this case, we should be able to get the farm lobbies on our side. Start feeling out our competitors as well. I can't imagine that they are any happier with the current regulatory framework for non-human genetic experimentation than we are. Maybe we can come up with something that is acceptable to us all and get it approved, as opposed to a simple exception for the bees.

"Now about the...." I broke off what I was going to say when one of my security people entered the room, came over to me, and whispered into my ear, "Natalie said to tell you that Green Gambit has gone active."

I gave him a quick thanks before turning to the people who managed my legitimate business interests and said, "My apologies everyone, a personal matter has come up and I'm going to have to reschedule," before leaving.

Once I was in my car, and with security who were part of my inner circle, I opened a portal to my Earth-side control center and stepped through. "Talk to me, Natasha."

She turned from the computer monitor and said, "Banner has gone Hulk and wrecked the Culver lab. Betty Ross is currently in the hospital and is expected to survive."

Most of the next month was spent with the two of us in armor, keeping an eye on things as events proceeded and dealing with the fallout. Finally though, on May 19th, Bruce managed to cross into Canada and break contact with Ross's troops after wrecking a border outpost. That event was suitably public that Ross was called before the Congressional Oversight Committee to explain his failings. Unfortunately for him, a little spider was waiting, and a sniper's bullet took off his head as he exited his car. The evidence would lead, tentatively of course, to Hammer Industries. Nothing could be proven, of course, but it appeared that Ross had a very cozy relationship with Justin Hammer, and the surmise by those in the know was that Hammer feared what he might say before Congress.

At the same time, the Ancient One and I were watching a lone campfire deep in the Canadian wilderness, and the man sleeping next to it, from the Astral Plane.

"Oh my, you do bring me the most interesting things, Octavian. Do you know what he is?" she asked.

"A man who will prove himself a great hero," I answered, deliberately misunderstanding the question.

"Very droll, and yes, he will be. But that wasn't what I was referring to. Tell me Octavian, what does divinity look like to you?" she asked, a hint of a chuckle in her voice.

"Divinity? I'll grant that he certainly has extraordinary power, but then, so do you, or even I for that matter. So why do you refer to Banner as divine?" I questioned.

"Because he is, Octavian. Divinity isn't a matter of power, although, by its very nature, everyone who is divine will be extraordinarily powerful. No, someone is divine when they become the living embodiment of a reality. Take Odin, he is Asgard in a very real sense. The only ways to defeat him are to destroy Asgard or to defeat him under the rules of Asgard. This man before us did something that has only occurred four times previously in all of human history: he made himself into the embodiment of an unclaimed reality. What makes him truly unique is that this is the first time it has been done through science, and not magic. Bruce Banner is the very embodiment of anger," she explained.

"And given the nature of the emotional-conceptual realities, so long as anger exists, that reality will exist. So if he is the embodiment of that reality, then so long as it exists, he too will exist," I said.

"Good, you were paying attention to your studies. You stopped one step short of full understanding though. Banner is the first entity to have ever embodied anger. In effect, he is the elder god of a new pantheon, a truly extraordinary event. Do you know that in all the infinite possible futures that existed before his ascension, he died in all but this one? Now that he exists, he was always going to exist, and given the timeless nature of anger, he has always existed and will always exist, but I could see the odds of him existing before he did exist, and they were so minute as to be incalculable." Her explanation quickly grants me a headache, with the temporal mechanics and paradoxes that were almost inherent when little things like elder gods and the Time Stone came into play.

"He will make an interesting student for you," she said before disappearing back to her body, giving her implicit approval to my plan.

I, too, returned to my body, resting in the Mirror Dimension, and then snapped my fingers, as I ripped Bruce into the Mirror Dimension with me.

He was on his feet and looking all about, but froze when he saw me.

"Relax Bruce, I'm just here to talk." I retracted my face mask.

"Octavian Raith? What are you doing here and where is here?" he questioned, obviously recognizing my face.

"I came to speak with you. It's not every day that something as eye-catching as your little transformation occurs, and I've been tracking you ever since you wrecked the Bio-Tech lab. I was waiting for an opportunity to talk. As for where we are, it's called the Mirror Dimension." I raised a hand as he went to interrupt. "Sounds all mystical I know, but I didn't develop the name. Think about it as having moved sideways in time the slightest amount, but the exact nature of this environment isn't really relevant though. What is relevant is that you are I are the only people in this particular Mirror Dimension, and if you go all green rage monster, then nothing in the real world will be damaged. Given that our conversation may well make you angry or afraid enough to go big and green, I figured it was only neighborly of me to ensure that no one else suffers any consequences from that eventuality."

It seems I offended him as suddenly I was face-to-face with the Hulk. I triggered my helmet to re-deploy, but otherwise just stood there and said, "Interesting, a p.l.e.a.s.u.r.e to meet you, Mr. Hulk. If it's not too much trouble, though, Mr. Banner and I were having a bit of a conversation."

He roared at me and swung a fist. I stopped it with two fingers, the Vibranium that made up my suit absorbing the energy. The routine, him punching me to no effect, continued for a few more iterations before the Hulk roared again and took a massive leap. Unfortunately for him, I had tagged him with a tracking spell and could just portal after him.

Almost two hours later, he was Banner again, and I said, "Calmed down now? Shall we chat Bruce?"

He had to visibly control himself, but eventually, he waved for me to sit on the ground beside him. "What do you want?"

I gave him a small smile. "To help you. Well, that and to recruit you. My R&D team could use someone of your genius."

"I won't be your weapon," he snarled back and started to stand.

I laughed. "Calmly Bruce, calmly. I don't want or need you as a weapon. At the moment, your alter ego is an out of control ball of anger and rage. At best, he is a weapon in the same way that a nuke is a weapon. No finesse, no precision targeting, just large scale destruction. Useful in some very rare situations, but extreme overkill with far too much collateral damage the vast majority of the time. No, I prefer controlled, precise, applications of force in my weapons.

"Besides, I already have my own abilities. Do recall that I shifted us sideways in time, Banner, and that this armor let me tank your alter ego's blows without flinching. No, I have no need to use you as a weapon, I already have all the 'weapons' that I need."

He sat back down a moment later and said, "Fine, say that I believe you. It doesn't matter, I've killed people and wrecked a lot of army equipment. Not to mention that I turn into a giant monster every time I get angry or afraid. I can't work for you."

"Oh? Let me be the judge of that. While I don't have the ability to clear things up with the government, I do have the resources to keep you hidden from them, and I am more than willing to provide you with a lab, lab assistants, and all the resources that you want or d.e.s.i.r.e. I'm sure you want to study what happened to you, and you love science too much to ever be happy outside of a lab."

"That may all be true, Raith, but it doesn't help me with my alter ego."

I gave a nod. "True. But this does." I waved a hand at our surroundings. "I can give you an environment to gain control in, without any fear that you will harm anyone else. I also have access to resources and knowledge that you haven't even begun to imagine exists. Let's talk about your little change. Did Ross ever tell you what that Serum you were working with was?"

Bruce's gaze sharpened, and he had an intent look in his eyes. "No, but I had some guesses."

"Well, it might interest you to know that his Serum was the blood of Captain America, one of the only known samples actually. Given that you had the same blood type, injecting it into your veins would have made you decently superhuman in its own right, but then you had to go and bombard yourself with massive amounts of gamma radiation. The results were interesting and unexpected. I'm slightly surprised that you survived, but that's another matter.

"The point I was going to make is that I have in my employ the world's foremost expert on Dr. Erskine's work and that our understanding of it is beyond what you will find anywhere else. If you want to understand what happened to you, then my labs are the best place for you to work."

"Who are you? Yeah, Raith Industries is doing some interesting work, but you don't even have a bio-enhancement program to my knowledge," he questioned.

"You ever hear of Maya Hansen?" I shot back.

"Yeah, she was doing some interesting work and published a few groundbreaking papers, before she dropped off the grid back in 2000. As far as I know, she hasn't done anything interesting since."

"Oh, she's done plenty of interesting things, we just don't publish. Dr. Hansen is running my human enhancement program and has a better grasp of the Serum than anyone else living."

"Making super-soldiers, Raith? I wasn't all that comfortable with that when I was doing it for the US government, what makes you think I would be willing to help a private company make them?" he asked, not sounding all that happy with my pitch.

"Not super-soldiers, Bruce, at least not as you imply. No, our goal is far larger than making mere soldiers. What we are attempting to do is produce a safe, affordable, process to give anyone who wants it a body on par with Captain America's and regeneration advanced enough that they will never again fall ill and never need to fear dying of old age. I've looked at the petty bullshit going on in the world Bruce and it disgusts me. So many small-minded people fearful of change and enamored with a status quo that threatens us all," I said with passion in my voice.

Bruce snorted. "Right, you think you've cracked the code to immortality, and you want to share it with everyone? Make your lies a little more believable, Raith."

"No lie, Bruce, and I am not the one who cracked it. What I am going to be is the one who mass produces it. I mean, it's not like immortality is exactly unknown. Hell, you just went and made yourself more immortal than anyone else on the entire planet," I countered, running through the long list of methods that had been used in the MCU for immortality - much less Marvel in general.

"WHAT? What do you mean?" Banner shouted.

"Exactly what I said, Banner. You've seen how fast and completely you heal now, so think about it. Perfect cellular regeneration means that you will not age and are thus immortal. Erskine's formula made Captain America the same way, and it was based on the blood of someone who was naturally that way. Other people have found their own ways into immortality over the eons as well, but what makes you exceptional when talking about immortals is that you went even further.

"To understand this I'm going to have to explain some of the nature of the universe to you, so b.a.r.e with me for the moment. Ok?" I offered.

Bruce was deep in thought for a moment, clearly thinking about what I had said. "Ok, and I suppose you are right that my body won't age, given my regeneration. I'll listen, but only because of this," he waved at the world around us, "is far enough outside what I know about physics to indicate that my knowledge is fundamentally flawed."

"Not flawed, just incomplete. The first thing you need to understand is that the physical world is only one level of existence. Indeed, it is best described as the synthesis of every other reality. I'm sure you have noticed how oddly things behave in high energy physics, or when you start talking about quantum physics. The reason for that oddity is that human science is just now brushing the edge of the greater existence. We are tentatively touching the boundaries between our reality and others.

"Now, every living thing exists on multiple levels of existence at the same time. One of those is called the Astral Plane, and it is the home of your soul, for lack of a better term. Think of it as the inherent energy that makes you, you, as far as existence is concerned. This plane acts as a gateway to countless others, but what concerns us right now are what are called emotional-conceptual realities.

"Think about an RPG or fantasy with things like a Plane of Love or L.u.s.t or Chaos or Order. These aren't physical things, and yet they can be said to exist. Whether the concept or the reality came first is unknown, but what matters is that every time you feel any emotion, you are feeding energy to that reality, or perhaps you are feeling that emotion because of a surge in energy from that reality. The mechanics are pretty fuzzy, and there is a reason that most everyone who deals with this stuff calls it magic.

"With me so far?" I said, giving Bruce a very basic primer on moderately advanced magical theory.

"Not really, no. I'm following what you are saying, but I think you're kinda nuts. Please continue though," he answered frankly.

"Good enough. What matters for you is that you managed to tap into one of those emotional-conceptual realities in your little experiment. If the normal connection between one's soul and one of these realities could be described as a 120 volt outlet in a home, you went and mainlined the full power of a nuclear reactor. It should have killed you, your body should have exploded with enough power to level most of V.i.r.g.i.nia. Fortunately for both you and everyone on the East Coast, you managed to absorb that energy. In your case, you tapped into the, for lack of a better term, Anger Reality and mainlined it through your soul. And that connection is permanent - it altered your soul in fundamental ways.

"You have, in effect, made yourself the very embodiment of Anger, and so as long as that reality continues to exist, so too will you," I said, having decided that I would be honest with Bruce and give him the full story instead of trying to deceive him.

"Right, I'm done, crazy man. This is such bullshit." Bruce stood.

"Oh, bullshit is it?" I waved a hand and a portal opened under us, suddenly we were sitting on the moon.

I was fine, thanks to the sealed environment provided by my suit, but Bruce immediately started to suffocate. Moments later, he was the Hulk in full fury. After letting him rage around on the mirror moon, I opened another portal and dropped him in the mirror of Betty Ross's living room where she was grieving, having just received the news of her father's assassination.

When the Hulk saw Betty he froze and, not seeing me, calmed down. Once Bruce was back to himself, I showed myself again.

"Exposed to the vacuum of space, and you are just fine Bruce. You can't cure yourself of the Hulk, but I can teach you how to harness and control its power. Since I know you don't really believe me right now, I will also give you all those resources you will need to attempt your cures. But that's for another time. I brought you here because General Ross was assassinated a little while ago on the steps of the Capitol, and Miss Ross just got the news. I thought she could use a friend." I finished before kicking him out of the Mirror Dimension and into his girlfriend's living room, before sitting in to watch.

I had to make sure he didn't try and tell anyone my secrets. I absolutely was not abusing massive cosmic power to watch a daytime soap opera. Nope, no siree bob.